Puppet Without Strings
by Frosted Bug
Summary: One high-profile assassination leaves a government baffled. In a desperate attempt to resolve matters, the army enlists the services of a certain dog demon and his hanyou brother. Their task? To hunt down a killer who doesn't exist. IK SKgr MS
1. Prologue

_**Puppet Without Strings**_

Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha.

* * *

**Prologue**

It was chilly for a mid-summer morning.

Unseen sky, veiled-over by ominous gray clouds, sprinkled its crystal tears upon the dark streets of Sengoku below. Such bleakness of atmosphere served to place further emphasis on the city's already desolate mood. It was as if the weather had been privy to the ceremony that was to take place and had altered its disposition to a darker, more suitable one.

Yet in the cold and rain; in this dreariest of settings, a silent crowd had gathered, their dark attire blending soundly with monotonous cobblestone surroundings, creating a deadened sea of grays and blacks and every shade in between. In this manner the people stood, overshadowed by an aura of sadness, to accept the condolences of gray skies above in lifeless stillness. Their eyes stayed fixated upon the charcoal vehicle traveling with depressing slowness down the empty road before them.

The funeral procession followed.

Central City's Grand Cathedral had a light-colouring that was unbefitting and out-of-place for an occasion such as this. It loomed, taunting, overhead as the funeral car pulled up before its marble steps. Yet it was into this building that officers from the city's top military units carried a single, obsidian casket while a pair of solemn figures, heads-bowed and expressions vacant, trailed after them.

Later on, an emotionally-loaded eulogy would be delivered and the grounds would be opened up to the public to pay their respects as was tradition. But through it all, the eyes of one Higurashi Kagome would stay dry and blank.

* * *

The newscaster on screen recited her prepared story in the steady, singsong tone that was unique to all newscasters. 

'Today, men and women, young and old alike, paid their individual farewells to President Higurash; beloved leader, and involuntary father to many who were gathered. This man who guided us through a time of war and destitution and led our people into brighter days, can never and will never be replaced.'

Pale fingers drummed on dark mahogany to an unheard rhythm as their owner sat in silent contemplation.

'Weeks, perhaps days prior to this moment, not a soul in this very crowd would have believed that our own Eiji Higurashi, survivor and ex-patriot of the great war that had robbed so many others of their lives, would meet his untimely end with something so seemingly petty as a heart disease….'

The figure let out a scoff.

"Hn. A heart disease. I'd have expected better of them…' 

A creaking of the door's rusty hinges signaled the entrance of another.

'Sir. She's returned--' 

The figure at the desk gave the screen a small sneer before turning to offer his subordinate a slight nod of acknowledgement. An elegant hand rose to wave the comment off.

'Right. Send her into storage.' 

The doorway's lone occupant nodded but stood his ground, shuffling his feet in nervous apprehension. A staunch silence befell the room then; almost deafening in its pungency. When the figure at the desk swung round to pose his question finally, the edgy subordinate all but collapsed in foreboding. He willed his legs to stone and put on as brave a front as was possible under the circumstances. The chill in his master's voice alone nearly broke his resolve.

'Now tell me, what went wrong?'

The standing demon's voice took on an edge of uneasiness to suit the rest of his body. He knew it was in his best interest to give his master the entire truth; the man had an eerily keen eye for deception but, by all accounts, lacked a similar degree of leniency. Down to the last detail was how he was to deliver his report.

'Sir. It seems we miscalculated…'

An unnerving pause.

'How so?'

Still water ran deep. The low, measured voice of his master seemed to epitomize that phrase. The reply to his question was slow; words had to be chosen carefully.

'There were more demons in Higurashi's guard unit than we'd predicted.'

This delivered; the weaker demon paused to study his master's face, trying in vain to gauge a reaction of any sort. He understood then; after failing for the third time. It was in those ebony eyes that could have frozen a thousand raging fires, that he saw the reason as to why this man was feared by so many. And, like a deer stilled by the magnificence of the lights that would precursor its doom, the younger demon continued to stare, so entranced that he almost failed to hear his master's next statement.

'I trust she took care of them then.'

A hesitant nod.

'Good. Traitors like those deserve to have their blood spilt, but that is no excuse for your other mistakes.'

The younger demon seized his chance. Now was as good a time as any to deliver the worst of the news.

'I'm sorry sir…' 

He was unprepared for the suddenness with which the voice of his master changed then. Laden with ice and threat, his next question was uttered so softly that he had to strain his ears to perceive it.

'I'll ask again. _What went wrong_?' 

Fresh sweat formed itself on the lesser demon's forehead. It glistened in the moonlight. His master's disconcerting gaze lingered on him, stemmed from intense, cruel eyes that could peer into the depths of one's very soul. For a while he could do naught but stand frozen once more, locked in place by the obsidian orbs that stared him down until he could take no more and had to look away. The next part of the report was still to be delivered.

'S-she… she was injured. One of the demon bodyguards took a slice at her. The b-bastard's claws went clean through her suit-…'

'And so she bled. She's left a means by which they can track her by. Funny. I distinctly remember you saying that the suit could withstand _any_ blow of _any_sort…'

'She was supposed to have avoided the hit! T-there was a lot of blood spilt that night! You shouldn't be concerned. It would be almost impossible to identify one individual's out of so many—'

'_Unless_ of course the humans acquire the services of ones from the demon race. Say, dog demons for instance. Their sense of smell could detect her a mile away. Now _they_ would be of most use in such a situation. _Wouldn't you say_?'

The demon leader started to rise from his seat with frightening grace that belied a great control over immense power. The young subordinate took a step back in fear, eyes darting frantically round for a means of escape.

'I assure you sir that it won't happen again. I won't fail a second time--'

The advancing figure ignored his words, intent on the delivery of his own speech.

'And _who_that we know of are currently _willingly _offering their services to those human scum?'

The voice questioned slowly with false patience, as though he were talking to a small child. Its owner continued to close the distance between himself and the now quivering, underling.

'Please sir…'

The frightened demon backed up some more, his instincts urging him to place as much distance as was possible from the advancing figure; it seemed larger, darker, more imposing the closer it got. It held up a deceptively slender hand, counting bony fingers off as it spoke.

'There's Sesshoumaru Taisho, heir to the dog demon lordship and _leader_, might I add, to Sengoku Military's Demon faction which consists of an elite division under the charge of a_ miko_…'

The utter impassiveness of the stronger demon's face served merely to accentuate the manic glint that had entered his obsidian eyes.

'…and there's also his scruffy little half-blood brother who, last time I checked was _part_of said elite division. _Both of whom_, if I've gotten my facts right, were sired by the late Inu Taisho. And both of whom, could potentially cause quite a bit of unnecessary trouble for one such as myself.'

When his back met cold concrete, the lesser demon froze, petrified. Wide eyes steadily lost focus, their pupils dilating with the sheer amount of fear their owner was experiencing.

'Exactly which part of that am I _not supposed to be concerned about?_'

The subordinate trembled. He could not speak for absolute terror of the man before him. It was just as well, for his demon master stood over him now, his eyes alone holding him in his place.

'Now tell me. How…'

Slender hands reached out to clasp the younger demon's face between them.

'…do you suppose…'

Dark head hovered in near his ear.

'…that you _not_ screwing up a second time…'

Tendrils of ebony hair broke free from their constricted braid and fell forward past slim, yukata-clad shoulders.

'…is going to solve a problem like that?'

The younger demon saw then, the inevitable. He shut his eyes and, for a split second, almost fooled himself into believing that the hands lightly resting on either side of his head were there to give him the gentlest of caresses.

A choked whimper was all the warning to signal the sickening crushing of bone that would follow. The petite figure in the corridor outside stood unphased.

* * *

_tbc..._


	2. Rulebreaker

_**Puppet Without Strings**_

* * *

**Chapter 1**

Sunlight was roasting his exposed behind.

He yanked the sheets up and twisted so as to squash himself right up against the wall of his bunk, trying to seek shelter from the scorching summer sun. Through the thick haze of sleep, his half-conscious mind churned up random unlinked images of sunscreen advertisements and skin cancer. He tried to think back to the last time he'd been able think coherently and found that thinking hurt his brain. Hurt his brain _a lot_.

'…_Fucking UV rays..._'

Despite the obvious lack of churning gears in his head, less-than-polished vocabulary still managed to filter from his mouth even in his inept and hung-over state.

The doors to his room slid abruptly open.

'Hey Inuyasha! What'd you go and do this time? Kaede's practically screaming place down.'

'Fuck off, monk. I'm not in the mood.'

This did not deter an obviously elated Miroku. He kept on talking as if the sight of his best friend hung-over and half-nude, save for the blanket covering thelower half of his body, was the most everyday occurrence in the whole world.

'She's picking on every able-bodied male soldier within athree mile radius. I'm thinking its because we all remotely remind her of you. Hate to say it pal, but you'll have made enemies of just about everyone in this unit by the time she calms down. Oh and put some clothes on will you?'

Inuyasha was not listening, while Miroku paced and ranted, he had buried his head under his bunk's lone pillow and resolved to proceed with his plan of ignoring the rest of the world for the next century or two. The monk turned his questionably worried voice on him, then.

'And I suggest you get up soon because chances are she's headed here this very mi—'

The door slid open again. No, scratch that. The door was unceremoniously _slammed _open, revealing a short and none-too-happy woman.

A voice which could have been described to resemble that of a million wild, angry... territorial lions filled the small five-by-five-square-meter room.

"INUYASHA!"

'Oh fuck,' was the subject's witty reply.

'Don't you _Oh fuck_ me you little mongrel! What the hellwere you _thinking_? Half the damn juvenile sector is still littered with beer bottles. The janitor is going ballistic about the whole mess! Kitsuno Shippo, who is _eight years old_, is still too drunk to write his own damn name! Even though I don't see how that's possible since the little brat was still able to hack into the sector's mainframe last night. The guards in the surveillance room had to deal with the pink foxes dancing across their computer screens for an entire hour. If there had been a security breach during that time, it would have gone unnoticed! You would have been held responsible! Honestly Inuyasha, alcohol? Alcohol! In a place like this! You're not even eighteen yet! And you gave some to _Shippo_ too!'

Kaede stopped to catch her breath. Ever since Inuyasha had joined her sector, she had been aging at an alarming rate. She had neither the strength nor the stamina to last through such long rants anymore. She stalked up to the seat Miroku was currently occupying in silence and motioned for him to give room. He hastily obliged, eager to learn more of Inuyasha's daring Saturday Night escapades. After making herself comfortable, she continued. Her voice no longer shrill. Instead, it was tired and irritated.

'There are two women, _two women _Inuyasha_, s_till being detained in my office after they were caught trying to sneak out through a suspicious hanyou-sized hole in the west wall that _hadn't_ been there last I checked. They claimed that you snuck them in for some,' her voicetook on a disgusted tone, '_fun,_ and told them to leave before the sun rose. What kind of an _imbecile _would sneak two _women_ into the all-male section of this division and expect them not to get noticed? You'd have to have a brain the size of a…'

Inuyasha tuned her out. Throughout her long speech, he had slowly been piecing the information together to form a semi-complete illustration of the previous night's events. He remembered vaguely jumping clean over the high outer wall encircling the division. He had done it countless times before. Something like that was no feat to someone who knew the area and the guards' shift changes as well as he did. He had originally intended for it to just be a one-time-getting-wasted thing. The girls had been a bonus. He had acquired the red head after pounding her annoying pest of a boyfriend for partner-abuse. Her perky little blonde friend had just tagged along.

He had not meant to get the brat Shippo drunk either but the little monster had been about to report him! A few bent truths and some very strong sake was all it had taken for the twerp to go limp. He had deposited him in his room! He swore he had! The brat must have woken up and gone all hack-happy with his stupid little laptop. He would have stopped him, had he not been busy doing other things. It was not and never had been any intention of his to get under-aged youngsters drunk.

_'Hell, it'd probably stunt his growth. As if the twerp isn't short enough already...'_

This guilty thought dissipated the minute Kaede uttered her next sentence.

'Everything from the janitor's salary to the short-circuited computers in the surveillance room to the damn _hole _in the west wall will be taken out of your pay.'

'What? The _hell _it will! Fuck, I'm practically working for free as it is!' Came his heated reply.

'And whose fault would that be? You haven't done much around here for a while. You don't train with the rest of the recruits—'

'I _can't _fucking train with them. I don't get enough of it if I do! And the only reason I've done nothing lately is because there _is _nothing to do!'

The former point was made with notable arrogance.

'And so how do you cope? You cause trouble for _me, _that's how! Don't think I haven't forgotten the time you got into that fight in the cafeteria! On top of landing the poor recipient of the beating half-dead in the infirmary, you managed to single-handedly destroy almost every catering machine in the area!'

'Keh! That was _so _not my fault. The little fucker was just screaming for it-'

At this Miroku, arms crossed and head bowed in reflection, cut in.

'Actually Inuyasha, I'd be inclined to agree with Ms Kaede on the matter. Those were horrible times you put us through. Remember how we'd have to wait in line in front of the call-in catering truck for god knows how long, waiting to be served? Sometimes it'd be raining and the food would turn cold and damp and grow mould even before we got down to eating it. The only machines you'd left intact were the salad ones with the dodgy synthetic vegetables that didn't even have decent dressing and—'

'Zip it traitor.'

Kaede cut in before the argument got too far off topic.

'I could very well list _every_ one of your exploits but I would just be wasting time and breath. The fact of the matter is, Inuyasha, that you owe a lot to this division and currently what little pay you have _will _be used in repairing the damages that _you _caused.'

She didn't even give him time to cringe.

'You will be abstained from future assignments until further notice, you will be serving nightly guard duty for the next two weeks _and_.. '

Inuyasha had never required anything of God. But now, he wanted a favour.

_'Kill me.'_

But Kaede was relentless.

'-and you will be running errands for me for the next week. Report to my office at half past five each morning, _on the dot_. I suggest you say your goodbyes to that bed, hanyou, because you won't be seeing it for a while.'

She rose tiredly from her seat, brushing off Miroku's inquiries about her unhealthy lack of facial colouring. She shuffled tiredly towards the door.

'Oh. And you will also be under strict curfew for the next two months. Be prepared to face dreadful consequences if you do not show up at your scheduled duties _on time_.'

At the sight of the protest forming on his lips she continued curtly.

'Orders from your brother.'

With that, the abused door slid shut once more behind her as she retreated from the now-silent room.

Miroku let out an amazed whistle.

'Not a word, monk. Or I swear I will maim, and I will bite.'

Silence. Miroku fidgeted.

'…I _mean _it Miroku.'

He twitched. Inuyasha glared.

More silence. A breeze.

'...So. Were they hot?'

'_MONK_!'

* * *


	3. Cover Up

_**Puppet Without Strings**_

* * *

**Chapter 2**

Sesshoumaru flicked the screen of his com-link close just as his half-brother's recorded message started to unleash a train of its most colourful language on him. The idiot just didn't know when to quit. He muted the device and focused his eyes on the road once more.

Inuyasha could wait.

Sesshoumaru had much more pressing matters to attend to. He'd been woken abruptly from his slumber forty minutes prior and told to hurry to Sengoku's Central Government Headquarters. An urgent meeting was to be held with the Chief of Defense.

He wondered what issue would deem itself so critical that a private council had to be called at five in the morning on a non-working day. His musings were cut short when he pulled to a stop astride the guard unit at headquarters. He flashed a gleaming name card and put his thumb to azure print scanner to be let through.

He parked in his usual spot behind the storage block of the immense fifty-storey structure that was his work place. He'd liked that it was secluded and had claimed the lot for his own when he'd first taken up his position asYoukai Devision Chief two years ago.

The sun had just begun to break the surface of the horizon as Sesshoumaru headed briskly toward building 1A's lift-lobby. He was surprised to find General Makoto already there and awaiting his arrival. Sesshoumaru immediately grasped that the direness of the situation when he saw the general flanked by not his usual entourage of bodyguards, but by only his head of security Hidetoshi Akio. To Sesshoumaru, this meant the meeting was to be of utmost confidentiality.

Hidetoshi lead the two men into the elevator and inserted his access key into the control panel. Various keycodes were entered before an additional option to travel down to the lowest underground level of the complex became available. Not many people at headquarters knew of this feature. It had been designed during the war to house leaders of importance in the event of nuclear fallout. Sesshoumaru had scoffed at the absurdity of this idea. Saving themselves so they could emerge later on to govern a people that would hate them for their cowardice? He failed to see the point.

Now this place served to provide an environment of privacy for ones who would require it. The elevator doors slid open and the three men stepped out. Makoto motioned for him to enter one of the sound-proof rooms in the vicinity. When the two men were inside, Hidetoshi shut the door and stood watch outside.

General Makoto was a stern man in his late fifties who sported a coarse moustache and head of graying tresses. He had been made Chief of Defence by President Higurashi himself and was now serving his fourth year in that position. His gray eyes met Sesshoumaru's golden ones. Funny how so much about the man was _gray_. He started speaking.

'I know you are one who does not like to beat around the bush so I'll get straight to the point.'

Sesshoumaru waited for him to continue. How considerate of the man to state the obvious.

'President Higurashi did not die of a heart disease. He was assassinated in his own summer home. The killer was never identified. I doubt he even saw it coming.'

He paused to allow Sesshoumaru to contemplate this bombardment of information. It did not take long. The youkai leader had already had his suspicions, what with the abruptness of the entire situation and the lack of information provided. He motioned for Makoto to continue.

'He'd wanted to take time off to spend with his kids. The lack of privacy irked him. He refused to have an entire brigade of guards trailing after his family, so he'd lessened security. Just one unit was allowed. Almost all personel present at the time were killed trying to protect him.'

If it was possible, Sesshoumaru's gaze became even more serious. An entire unit defeated?

'How many attackers were there?'

If the grave expression on Makoto's face and the hesistation in his voice were any indication, Sesshouaru doubted he'd much like the answer to that question.

'According to surveillance videos and accounts from the general's children. Just one,' the General frowned at the absurdity of it all.

The slight raising of Sesshoumaru's right eyebrow forced him to continue.

'The president was well-protected. Do not doubt it. The guard unit was eight strong, three of whom were, in fact, youkai. Does the name Hizashi Kouga ring a bell?'

Sesshoumaru, though stunned, showed no outward sign of it. He gave a small nod.

'I served with him in the war. Why was this not brought to my attention? Was he killed?'

'As you know we have kept this matter under a tight government leash. Hizashi Kouga was probably the only individual at the scene who was able to actually harm the intruder. It seems that whoever he was, was wearing some sort of protective suit. Weapons were useless against it. The attacker had assassinated the President and been going for the daughter when Kouga confronted him.'

The General sighed and brought calloused fingers up to the bridge of his nose.

'God only knows how but Kouga managed to damage the suit and injure the killer. He seemed to have been scared off after that. Probably didn't count on sustaining _any _injury at all. However, Kouga took a severe beating in the processand has yet to wake from the ordeal. He is being held in Basement Four of this very building. There was the risk that the assassin might return to finish him off so we needed to keep him under surveillance.'

Kouga hadn't been sent to a hospital. That explained why he had not known about the man's condition. Come to think of it he hadn't heard from the wolf demon in almost a year, ever since he'd started his bodyguarding duties. Sesshoumaru pushed that thought aside. He waited for the general to continue.

Makoto's head had started hurting again. His fingers twitched for a cigar, not so much to smoke, but to feel its familiar weight between them. It was a force of habit; to have something normal, habitual to grasp on to; to keep the inconsistencies of life from getting the better of you. Or at the very least, it helped to alleviate stress.The general pushed his urge aside and met Sesshoumaru's eyes once more.

'However, the fact remains that had Kouga not intervened, Higurashi Kagome and her brother Souta might not be alive right now. This was no young radical. Whoever it was, has certainly been trained to perfection; probably working under someone else's orders.'

'A hired killer?'

'Or a follower of some sort, yes.'

Sesshoumaru went into stoic contemplation mode with head slightly bowed and bangs partially obscuring his distant eyes. Why would someone want the Higurashis' dead? As far as he'd known, the late President was well-loved among humans and demons alike. He'd put an end to prejudice between the two races by willingly fighting side by side with demons in the war. It made little sense. Makoto's voice cut through his musings.

'We believe there are still radical factions out there who desire the segregation of humans and demons. But not everyone knows this.'

This, Sesshoumaru understood only too well. Most of Sengoku's people had struggled through the hardships of war. Many clung to the fervent belief that their hard-earned peace would not simply shatter from under them. This was why it was necessary to hide the true nature of the president's death from the public. The unrest that would haven been caused would likely have been catastrophic otherwise.

President Higurashi had, after all, been a central figurehead to the idea of equality between humans and demons.

'If word of the assisination got out, humans would blame demons because no normal human being would have been able to accomplish what this assassin has accomplished. Demons would retaliate. It could start an internal conflict.'

Sesshoumaru nodded silent agreement.

'So what would you require me to do?'

The general nearly smiled at this.

_'Straight to the point, as always.' _

The resemblance between Sesshoumaru Taisho and his father were uncanny.

'I'm putting you in charge of the investigation. All possible eye-witnesses were taken care of by the assassin. The Higurashi children aren't of much help since they never actually came into close contact with the killer. The only reliable source we have is lying in a coma six floors up. We still have traces of the assassin's blood that we retrieved from under Kouga's claws. But all DNA testing has pulled up nothing. No files. No matches. Youkai senses would probably be of far more use to this investigation than any technology we could provide.'

'I see. And what of the young Higurashi 's? The assassin might strike again.'

The General waved this off.

'They have already been assigned protection.'

Sesshoumaru once again fell into his quiet musings. In the event that the assassin returned, there was a chance he would not be present at the scene to capture or identify him. In such a case he wouldn't want strangers protecting the General's children. He'd want somebody who understood his investigations. Someone he could trust with his findings. He'd need someone who was strong enough to fend off such a skilled assailant. Someone whose senses worked as similarly to his as possible so he could relay information that Sesshoumaru could understand and use.

This someone his mind was conjuring. He looked awfully similar to…

Sesshoumaru cringed. Inwardly of course. He tried sifting through his thoughts for other alternatives but found none. Kouga had used to be that person. But now, only one other face kept popping up...

'General Makoto. Might I suggest that I assign people of my own choosing to guard the Higurashi children?'

Makoto looked inquisitive.

'Who do you have in mind?'

Sesshoumaru sighed. There was no other choice then. God, how he hated life sometimes.

'My brother, Inuyasha.'

* * *


	4. Preparations

**_Puppet Without Strings_**

* * *

**Chapter 3  
**

There were two things in life that Inuyasha despised. One was cheap manual labour and the other; _exploited_ cheap manual labour This explained his current agitated state of mind as he transported boxes upon boxes of paper work up the six flights of stairs to Kaede's office. It just so happened that the _only_ elevator in the vicinity was the one that led straight to the reception area of Inuyasha's intended destination. The same one that Kaede had exclusive rights to and had forbidden him to use.

_'What is this, the fucking sixteenth century? If they're going to rob me of my salary the least they could do is install a decent goddamn elevator forthe rest of us _working _individuals.'_

A zillion thoughts ran through his head as he scaled the final five steps, most of which consisted various four-letter profanities. By the time he'd reached the top, Inuyasha could have proudly claimed that he had invented a whole page of brand new swear words to add to his steadily growing vocabulary. He continued down the long corridor.

The past four days had been very routine. The same six flights of stairs to be climbed. The same corridor to be walked down. The same dread for the same annoying lecture to be received. He did not know how much more he could take.

Guard duty was the easy part. There was nothing like a couple of rounds and a few dozen poker games to while away the time. It was what came after _that _that Inuyasha so absolutely loathed. He would get barely an hour of sleep after guard duty, (usually on one of the mess halls' greasy benches) before having to drag his ass up again and report himself to Kaede.

Only then were the true horrors of his day to be unleashed. At first it had seemed bearable enough. He'd been given mundane albeit boring assignments like the one he was doing now. Other tasks had ranged from highly mediocre; shifting Kaede's furniture, to highly unpleasant, like when he'd been made to unload _toiletries_ from the provisions vehicle. Stocking restrooms with toilet paper was the most degrading thing he had ever had to do in all his seventeen years, eleven months and fourteen days. And he had gained _nothing_from it save for newfound respect and appreciation for the janitorial staff of Sector So54.

And then, had come _yesterday. _

If there ever was a moment when Inuyasha could have sworn that he had truly been afraid, the afternoon of Wednesday the 15th… _yesterday, _would have been that the time.

Learning the true meaning of suffering had been humbling at the very least. When Kaede had informed him of an instructing job, he had jumped at the opportunity. Teaching a bunch of puny youkai whelps how to track a moving target through the forest? Piece of cake! They were _youkai. _The ability should have been _ingrained _into them from birth. Besides, anything would have been better than janitorial duties right?

No, _not right_. Never right.

Being an instructor for Sector So54's youngest division squad had been, to put it very lightly, pure and simple _hell. _Inuyasha vaguely remembered someone telling him once, that it was never wise to judge a man by his outward appearance. What that someone had failed to mention was that the advice could pertain to rabid, seven-year-old, full-blooded demon children as well.

In the three hours that his session had lasted, Inuyasha had been ganged up on, cried on, spat on, sat on, pranked, scorned, maimed, trampled and even… God he did not even want to go there. His right wrist still sported slight indentations from when one of the psychotic brats had tried to swallow his fist whole. He'd walked around for a full fifteen minutes with the kid still hanging off him!

He'd also come to realize just _how _attached young children could become to soft, furry objects. His ears twitched at the memory. He'd stared at himself long and hard in the mirror after the lesson. He'd sworn that his ears had become… _longer._

He was sure old lady Kaede had taken a great amount of perverse pleasure in seeing him drag his almost-limp body into her office by the time the afternoon had ended.

He'd fallen asleep during guard duty that night.

Which would explain his current predicament. The load he was carrying had to have been five times the usual amount. The old lady was relentless. _No one_ could have gone through this much paperwork in so short a time. He was certain she was making him do this just for the fun of it. Kaede had an evil streak that was unbefitting for a miko of her caliber.

Over the stacks of folders and paperwork, Inuyasha just barely avoided crashing into the door of her office. He struggled to balance his burden on one arm, using the door as a brace, while he pushed the large grey button on the access panel.

'Yes?' Came Kaede's voice over the intercom.

Inuyasha's voice was strained. The mound of folders looked about ready to topple.

'Open the door old lady.'

It stayed shut for a while as Kaede, not even glancing up from her current focus, let her hand hover over the desk's control panel. She found the right button after a needlessly long moment.

'That's _Chief Kaede_ to you.'

Inuyasha ignored the intercom's message and strode in. He stopped short as a familiar scent reached his nose. A new voice was heard.

'Hn. An errand boy? And just when I didn't think you could sink any lower. If only father could see you now.'

The voice was taunting. Inuyasha didn't need to see its owner to identify him. He scowled.

'Nice to see you too, _big brother_.'

He placed his massive load down on the filing cabinet none too gently. Then rose slowly to face his older half-brother, who looked mildly amused. Sesshoumaru turned to Kaede.

'You didn't tell him?'

The reply was laden with surpressed glee.

'I thought I'd leave it up to you, Sesshoumaru.'

'I see.'

Inuyasha gaze shifted between the two other occupants of the room, before finally resting on Kaede.

'Tell me what?'

He had a feeling that he wouldn't like the answer, but he wanted to know. The childish streak in him resented being held out on information. Kaede turned to face him, eyes wide like that of a child's. A very evil child harbouring a very evil secret. Inuyasha's eyes narrowed. Sesshoumaru sighed and decided to get this over with.

'Your penalty's been lifted. You're needed for an assignment. I called in yesterday morning to inform Chief Kaede. I said I would be flying in.'

Inuyasha turned an accusing glare on the old lady.

'And just _when _were you planning on telling me this!'

Kaede's reply sounded bored. But Inuyasha could have sworn he'd heard her _cackle_.

'Must have slipped my mind, Taisho. After all, yesterday morning was hectic and the whole issue of getting the children a substitute instructor was _so_ much more pressing.'

Inuyasha's eyes widened.

'I've been let off since yesterday! The whole instructing thing. It really wasn't even _necessary_!'

His voice had risen to an annoyingly high volume. Sesshoumaru almost cringed at the assault on his sensitive ears. Kaede pretended to ponder this.

'Well, I guess that would be correct, Inuyasha! Oh, how very _silly_ of me!'

She was definitely cackling now.

Inuyasha was appalled. His throbbing fist, the bruises lining his back, his over-stretched ears, his _hurting ego_, all of it could have been _avoided? _He felt exploited. Cheated. He felt _used. _

Why? Why did Kaede hate him so?

Sesshoumaru was intrigued. He did not think it was possible for a person, human or demon, to have their jaws drop as low as Inuyasha's was hanging now. But then again, he reasoned, Inuyasha was neither human _nor _demon. When his brother's face started to glow an unhealthy crimson, he decided to intervene before things got ugly.

'You do know that hurting your Section Chief is a punishable crime.'

Inuyasha chose to ignore him and continued to glower. His mind entertained a series of very bloody and gruesome images. Sesshoumaru's voice turned serious.

'Enough of this. The situation is urgent. Pack any necessities you might need and be ready to leave at the Helipad in an hour. You will be briefed on the flight. Be prepared to be staying at the capital for a while. From now on, you will be taking orders from me.'

Inuyasha paused in his seething momentarily to throw a shocked glance his brother's way.

'_You?'_

If it was possible, his eyes had gotten even wider. He must have presented quite a laughable image at the moment, but Inuyasha didn't care. One shouldn't misunderstand. He did love his brother and all. But the man was a proverbial _slave driver._ _'Perfectionist' _didn't even beginto describe how relentless Sesshoumaru was! Hell, it was the trait that had gotten him his current position in the first place!

'Yes Inuyasha, me. Now stop wasting time and get ready.'

With that, he turned on his heel, white mane flinging in a low arc, and exited the room. Kaede watched his retreating back for only a moment before turning to face the unmoving youth in front of her.

'Did you not hear him, Taisho? You are dismissed. Do as he says.'

This snapped Inuyasha out of his shock-induced reverie. A low growl escaped his lips, before he too turned to take his leave. The floor seemed to shake with his every step. But even this loud exit did not prevent sharp canine hearing from picking up Kaede's next uttered words.

'Good luck, kiddo.'

The next seventy-two hours saw Inuyasha delivered to Sengoku City and bombarded with a myriad of assignment details. Sesshoumaru drilled him weary on what was required of his performance. For the next few months, he would be the unnoticed second shadow to Higurashi Kagome and her brother Souta. He was expected to know _every _detail of their daily schedules, where they were and who they were with at _all _hours of every day.

Sesshoumaru had handed him fact after shocking fact of the true details of President Higurashi's death. He'd decided it best that Inuyasha's new guarding duties not be disclosed to the recipients. He needed every little edge on this enemy that he could possibly get. Each of the Higurashi children had a guard assigned officially to them at all times. If the killer did choose to return, he'd only be ready to fend off two enemies. Inuyasha and Sesshoumaru's intervention would come as a shocker and with any luck, this element of surprise would be the thing that would bring about the killer's downfall.

Since the time he had arrived, Inuyasha had not had an ounce of rest . He wasn't a vain person by any standards. But heworriedwhether the skin below his eyes would be permanently sagged from the amount of sleep-deficit he had been experiencing.

Currently, he sat in front of the large platinum computer screen of Sesshoumaru's forty-fifth storey penthouse apartment, trying to absorb every bit of information he possibly could on the president's mysterious killer. Contrary to what many of his fellow sector-mates had been inclined to believe, Inuyasha could be _very_ meticulous if he so wanted. He wasn't lazy; he just rather liked to think that not attempting something was far better than doing a half-bit job of it. Which was why in most situations, Inuyasha just preferred not to bother.

This case, however, intrigued him. There was just so much _obscurity_ to it that his interest had been piqued the moment Sesshoumaru had finished his first briefing.

Inuyasha scrolled the page down on the computer. There wasn't much information to go by. A few rather worthless physical observations were all that had been provided.

_**Name (Full): **Unknown_

_**Height:** 155cm/ 5''1_

_**Weight:** Approx. 48kg/ 105.5lb_

_**Gender: **Undetermined_

_**Age:** Undetermined_

_**Eye Colour:** Undetermined_

_**Hair Colour:** Undetermined_

_**Blood Type: **A_

_**DNA Record: **Unmatched_

The vagueness of the profile was frustrating. He'd viewed surveillance videos from the time of the assassination. The bastard was fast. Too fast. He'd damn near _disappeared _from view when the guards had opened fire. Practically run head-long into four of them and hadn't gained so much as a _scratch. _His body suit had covered up every inch of skin. Not so much as an opening for his eyes to see through had been present.

Inuyasha sighed. For the past five years, he'd trained himself meticulously, sometimes even to the point of collapse. He hadn't had any reason to doubt his abilities as a fighter. Until now that is.

The negative thoughts were cut short as his brother strode purposefully into the room. He was carrying something round and metallic. Sesshoumaru stopped in front of the desk and tossed the item at him. He caught it a few inches from his face and held it up to examine. It looked like some sort of electronic wristband. It was several inches thick, with a well-disguised control panel on its underside. Inuyasha raised his left eyebrow.

'And this would be?'

'An invention of Toutousai's.'

He gestured to Inuyasha's left wrist.

'Put it on.'

Inuyasha was skeptical. Toutousai was a strange and wrinkled old prune of a scientist who was as psychologically unstable as he was brilliant.

'That wasn't a request, mutt.'

Inuyasha growled low and cautiously slipped his hand through the metal band. It seemed harmless enough, if a little too big. He yelped in surprise when the catches on the ends of the device clamped down suddenly on his unsuspecting arm. The metal strips holding the two halves of the device together retracted to secure the band, chokingly tight, around Inuyasha's upper forearm. He felt something sharp, needle-like pierce itself into the skin near his pulse.

'_Fuck!_ What the hell isthis?'

He struggled in vain to remove the offending object from his person.

'Thatlittle brother, is what you will be wearing for the entire length of time you will be watching the Higurashi's.'

He stepped over and yanked Inuyasha's banded arm up to face-level. Twisting it around (while ignoring Inuyasha's pained protest), he punched in some buttons on the control panel of the device before releasing his brother's arm. For the next ten seconds, nothing of importance happened.

Then, to Inuyasha's sheer and utter horror, he felt the change happening. Pointed canines flattened out as his claws retracted and softened to become fingernails. Majestic white mane dulled and greyed before finally turning a deep ebony while his eyes lost their feral golden tint to settle on a lackluster dark brown. Lastly, Inuyasha felt his canine ears shrink back to be replaced with human ones at both sides of his head.

'Sesshoumaru!'

His brother shrugged.

'You as a hanyou would be conspicuous. This device has connected and familiarized itself with your blood stream. It is able to induce humanness upon you by drawing out your mortal blood.'

'Just how the _hell_ do you expect me to fight a fucking near-invincible murderer in a state like this!'

Sesshoumaru's eyebrow twitched. Apparently stupidity was not an inherited characteristic. He was quite sure neither his dad nor Inuyasha's mother, Izayoi had had an IQ of lower than a hundred and fifty. Inuyasha had gained the trait for idiocy all on his own.

'Which is precisely why there are key codes to change you back, idiot. Yours is IY239.'

'Keh! You could have told me sooner!'

Sesshoumaru sighed.

Monday morning saw Inuyasha striding down the halls of Sengoku National Institute of Education sporting its uniform white shirt, long dark trousers and a navy blue blazer, as well as a fake name. He felt silly and out of place in a facility of such prestige. SNIE was an institution for the rich and famous. Government officials and people of various other positions of leadership sent their children to this place in the hopes of creating _more _government officials and people of various other positions of leadership.

Inuyasha now understood why his brother had wanted him to take on a human appearance. There was barely a demon-blooded individual in the entire establishment. His hanyou form would have stood out like a sore, glowing red thumb.

Youkai rarely did receive normal schooling. Most of them would have been taken in by the military at the enrollment age of seven. While the army taught their kids how to serve and protect, academies like these prepped their children for future electoral positions.

He'd already reported himself to Jaken, an annoying and wrinkled old geezer with the voice of a dying toad. Jaken had been Sesshoumaru's other choice for the assignment. The old pest had been a comrade of Sess's during the war. He'd been enrolled as a history teacher and dormitory master for the school. He would be the one Inuyasha was to turn to should he require access to special parts of the academy that were not open to students under normal circumstances.

Having made the necessary arrangements (and altered his schedule so he would be as near as possible to both Higurashi children at all times), he made his way down to the school's main doors. There, he positioned himself against a not-too-noticeable pillar and pretended to be interested in his mobile phone while he waited for the Higurashi limousine to arrive.

­'_The schedule said 8:30.'_

Sure enough, at exactly thirty minutes past eight, thevehiclecarrying Higurashi Kagome and Higurashi Souta, pulled up in front of the academy steps.

All chatter quieted the minute the car doors opened. Inuyasha would have heard a pin drop even with his diminished senses. The two bodyguards stepped out carrying the Higurashis' luggage with them. The silence became deafening as the next figure emerged from the vehicle.

First a pale leg, then a slender hand. Higurashi Kagome appeared, looking for all the world like she hadn't been happy in years.

* * *


	5. Kagome's Solace

**_Puppet Without Strings_**

* * *

**Chapter 4**

_A tall figure in uniform knelt down on one knee to face a young child of six. _

_"Kagome, something's come up. I have to leave the country for a while."_

_"But its the eighteenth. We always visit mommy's grave on the eighteenth."_

_"I know, I'm sorry Kagome-chan. Please be understanding."_

_The scene changed. A man sat at the desk of his personal study. Light, approaching footsteps signaled someone's arrival through the room's double doors. The same child, older by a few years, dashed in and scrambled onto her father's lap._

_"Dad! Our school's having a performance! Mrs. Kawamoto said she wants me to lead the junior choir!"_

_"What? With that squeaky voice?" Came the teasing reply._

_"Hey! She said I was 'musically inclined'," the child raised her hands in gesture. Her father ruffled her hair._

_"So, so dad! Can you come? It's on the first of next month."_

_The man's smile drooped. _

_"I need to meet Arashi's Governor on that day. There's been trouble in that area."_

_"But its Children's Day!"_

_The child's eyes had lost their joyful glimmer. _

_"I know. I'm sorry Kagome-chan. I promise I'll make it up to you."_

_The reply was dejected. _

_"That's okay dad. It isn't important anyways."_

_The study dissipated. In its place appeared a lavishly furnished bedroom. The same girl, now a teenager, sat on her four-poster bed with her head bowed as a fuming father paced in front of her._

_"What were you thinking Kagome!" _

_"I'm sorry, dad. I-I wasn't thinking. I've stopped takin-" _

_"-Damn right you weren't! I had more faith in your discretion than that! Do you know how badly this would reflect on our country's leadership?"_

_The girl felt her insides get hot. _

_"How badly it would reflect on you, you mean!"_

_The pacing stopped. Her father rounded on her. _

_"Is- is this…? Oh, I get it now! It's hormones isn't it? This must be some sort of silly teenage phase! Because the Kagome I know would never be so imprudent!"_

_"The Kagome you know is OUT OF DATE! Your chauffer has seen more of you than I have in the last four years! Souta's practically been raised by his nanny! It's like- IT'S LIKE WE DON'T EVEN HAVE A FATHER ANYMORE!"_

_Her voice was raised. She'd never raised her voice to her father before. All anger in the man's eyes dissipated the moment that last sentence left her lips. His mouth opened and closed several times as his mind tried to form a coherent reply. In the end, all he could do was sigh dejectedly. _

_"D-dad I- I didn't- I mean…" _

_"I know. I'm sorry Kagome-chan. Just- just be more careful next time."_

_The scene shifted again to the breakfast table of five days later as three members of the same family ate in silence. The father was the first to speak._

_"I bought us a summer home in the Genrai Hills. I was thinking we should take a trip there. My schedule's been cleared for a week so… what do you say, kids?"_

_The boy cheered. The girl stared. __Their father turned to face her. His eyes were pleading. She could see apology in their depths. _

_She smiled at him. _

_Once more the scene shifted. The new room was dark and cold, but the stains of blood on the walls could be clearly seen. __The girl was crying. _

_"Dad… Daddy, hold on! People are coming. They'll help you!" _

_The man tried to smile. His eyes were dimming and he found it hard to focus on the daughter leaning over him. He knew what was coming. He could feel it._

_"Dad, please don't leave. We need you, daddy. Please…"_

_"I-I know. I'm sorry…Kagome…chan…"_

* * *

"-gome-san…" 

"Higurashi Kagome-san…"

Kagome was shaken awake by the bony fingers of her English teacher. She looked up blearily only to realize that the entire class had been staring. She turned crimson and muttered a hasty apology to Professor Leonard. Rather than being annoyed like she would have expected, the man seemed instead… nervous. She found out why a few seconds later when she glanced down at her arms, which she had used to pillow her head.

They were damp with tears. She'd been crying in her sleep and it showed. She hurriedly wiped at her eyes and offered her professor a small apologetic smile.

It had been like this for the three weeks since her father had died. People would be overly cautious and skittish around her, as if they were afraid she might have some sort of mental breakdown if they said or did something wrong. Students in the cafeteria would go out of their way to give her a seat. The halls would turn silent as she walked through them. She'd receive random inquiries as to her well being from absolute strangers. She was getting tired of it. She'd been in school no more than a week, and it was already starting to get on her nerves.

She knew what people said behind her back. She'd overheard a conversation from Kanzaki Naomi's group once. The school's resident gossip-queen had speculated that it had been _Kagome _that had caused her father's untimely demise. She'd stood just round the corner with fists clenched and eyes squeezed shut, as she'd listened to Naomi inform her friends about just how her 'delinquent behaviour' must have caused the president to die from shock. That, she'd said, would _perfectly_ explain why he had met his death of heart failure just a few days after Kagome's drug-abusing tendencies had been revealed by the media.

Yes. Kagome knew what they said behind her back.

Rhythmic chiming signaled the arrival of lunch and students filed into the hallways. Kagome followed the crowd and met up with her friends at their usual spot near the second floor east-wing lockers. She was aware of the presence of her female youkai bodyguard somewhere close by. Kagome remained pretty much quiet during their meal. Her friend Eri, never one for awkward silences, had filled in the time with pointless chatter to hide her nervousness. Kagome had never spoken to them of her feelings. Her friends danced around the topic of her father's death with so much carefulness that it was painful to watch. When Kagome excused herself to go to the bathroom, all three of them visibly relaxed, though they tried hard not to show it.

To get to the nearest restroom, Kagome had to pass the teacher's lounge. She stopped short when she caught her name in a conversation that filtered out from the slight crack in the open door.

"-actually cried?"

"Yes. I hardly knew what to do. I mean, I've never seen Higurashi Kagome so much as let out a sniffle before."

"Yes, it was rather unsettling that she hadn't shed a single tear since that time. It's a relief to know that she does grieve for the man. I wonder how she's really coping. I mean, I imagine the guilt would be unbearable-"

"Indeed. She hides it well, but it must be tearing her up inside."

Kagome had to get away before she broke down right then and there.

_'Even the adults believe I caused dad to die.'_

Her brisk strides soon turned into a full on run as she pelted through hallways, ignoring inquiries from students and teachers about her well-being.

"Higurashi-san, are you all right?"

"Higurashi-san, are you okay?"

"Higurashi-san, you don't look too well."

"Higurashi-san, do you need me to call a teacher?"

"Higurashi-san!"

"Higurashi-san!"

Liars. Frauds. All of them.

She rounded another corner, nearly colliding into a startled group of seventh years and burst through the stairwell door, heading for the school roof. That place had always been her sanctuary. She took the steps two, even three at a time, wanting, _needing_ to get away from everyone else as quickly as possible.

It wasn't so much that Kagome felt wronged by the rumours. Some part of her, a very large part, felt that they had in fact hit very close to the truth.

It had been _her _selfishness and immaturity that had made her father feel guilty about forsaking time with his kids to serve his country. It had been _her _hurtful words that had forced her father to try and make it up to her by taking the family out to the secluded Genrai Hills, far away from medical assistance. It had been _her _complaints about never having enough privacy that had made her father lessen security during their stay.

She heard her bodyguard, Kouran, ascending the stairs after her.

"Miss Kagome! Please stop!"

"Go away, Kouran. Just give me some time alone!"

"I can't comply with that request Miss Kagome. You are to be protected at all times."

Kagome was starting to panic. Weeks of having been made to hide the truth, when all she saw in her dreams was her father's blood spattered corpse in the dark of his room; Weeks of having surpressed her emotions: guilt, sorrow, pain, frustration, anger; Weeks of having had no one to pour her heart out to as she'd struggled with the loss of her most important person; all these finally took their toll on her. She could feel something pulse deep within her torso. Her heart thundered. The ringing in her ears had become deafening and Kouran's strong grip on her shoulder marked her breaking point. Kagome felt something burst from inside.

Kouran wasn't able to let out so much as a gasp before she was hurled down a flight of stairs by an immense, invisible force. She fell to the ground in pain and everything went black.

* * *

Inuyasha looked up from his laptop screen. He'd sensed a reasonably powerful surge of energy just then. It was like what he felt every time Kaede used her miko abilities to purify sector So54's weapons. It had come from somewhere close. Very close. 

He glanced at his tracking screen to check on his charges' positions and nearly yelped in surprised when he realized the girl, Kagome, was no more than fifty feet from him.

_'The stairwell! She must be in the stairwell.'_

But that was the direction he'd felt that rush of energy from.

"Shit!" 

He leapt away from his perch against the roof's protective railing and sprinted towards the door that connected the roof to the stairway. In his haste, he almost forgot to revert back to his human form. Almost.

* * *

Kagome stepped back in horror. She had done _that _again. She hadn't meant to. She just hadn't been able to control herself. Kouran was still breathing. She needed to get help! 

Willing her frozen legs to start moving was difficult. Her frayed nerves refused to let her. She heard footsteps coming from the roof.

Inuyasha saw the girl at the last moment. He tried to bring his legs into a sudden stop but had been going so fast that he stumbled and nearly lost his balance. Rather than tumbling down an entire flight of steps to his possible death, Inuyasha chose to jump. The joints in his legs jarred painfully as he made a thunderous landing one floor down. 

This placed him directly beside a distraught and hyperventilating Higurashi Kagome.

"Well, that was graceful," he muttered as he straightened his stance. The unmoving figure of Kouran caught his eye.

"What happened here?" 

He tried to keep his voice as calm as possible. The Kagome girl seemed about ready to collapse.

"Please! You have to help me! Kouran's been hurt."

_'No. Not just hurt. She's been purified. What the hell…?'_

Inuyasha was already moving. He'd been in too many similar situations to be shocked by one unconscious female. His military training kicked in and he picked up the demoness to sling over his shoulder. This was done with a grunt.

_'Damn this bitch is heavy.'_

His human form may have been weak, but for once, he was grateful for his mortal blood. Picking up the cat youkai, whose body still retained traces of purifying energy, would have been rather painful otherwise. He started towards the infirmary but realized after taking five steps that the Kagome girl was still rooted to the spot.

"Well," he demanded, "you coming or what!" 

The boy's snappish question broke Kagome out of her reverie and she quickly followed after him. Amidst curious stares and whispered comments, the pair hurried through the school.

_'So much for 'inconspicuous'. Sesshoumaru's going to skin me alive.'_

A minute was all it took for the pair to reach the school's infirmary.

Now, parents didn't pay millions of yen a year to send their kids to SNIE for nothing. The institute had first-rate medical facilities and a resident doctor to go with it. The same doctor whose eyes were currently bulged at the sight of them. Teenage-boy-carrying-smoking-youkai-body must not have been a very common occurrence in Sengoku National.

"What on earth-"

"Help now, talk later, doc."

Inuyasha strode right past him.

"Right, right. Place her on the examination bench."

Inuyasha did so, then motioned for the doctor to set to work.

"Nurse Izumi! Report to the examination room at once. You two, please wait outside for now."

Doctor's orders. The pair left the room.

Inuyasha plonked himself down on one of the waiting area's many available seats and busied himself with looking indifferent. An awkward silence befell the room's two occupants, in which Inuyasha contented himself with studying the girl in the periphery of his vision.

She was shivering slightly. Most likely from shock, Inuyasha hypothesized.

He sighed. This was bad. Sesshoumaru had made it clear that contact with his protected should be kept to an absolute minimum. But the situation had been out of his control. Under current circumstances, the unavailability of her bodyguard meant that he was required to watch her until a replacement could arrive.

Plus, there was the whole issue of the energy blast.

Had the assassin entered school grounds and purified Kagome's bodyguard so he could get to her and her brother?

_'No. That's not right.'_

Inuyasha would have known if there had been an intruder. The academy's security was top notch. He'd had every surveillance camera in the school linked up to his computer and his computer monitored almost _constantly_. Plus, there was no way the intruder could have purified this Kouran, and just left Kagome standing there unharmed like that.

_'So that would mean…'_

Inuyasha frowned and cast a pointed glance Kagome's way_. That _slip of a girl had done it? There hadn't been anyone else around. But that didn't make sense. Such abilities were only limited to people like Kaede and Miroku. Usually, miko were scouted at very young ages. Their powers had to be honed in order to have potent effect. This girl was way too old to be untrained. She couldn't have let loose so strong a surge of energy without having been properly taught to do so first. Yet, Inuyasha had his doubts. He remembered the time he'd watched Kaede purify the sector's weaponry. She'd been drained and exhausted afterward. Kagome looked somewhat like she did then, shivering and pale, albeit more so than the old lady had been.

_'Gah! This is too annoying. I'll figure it out later with Sesshoumaru.'_

He'd let his older brother do the thinking since that was what Sesshoumaru did best. Inuyasha removed his blazer and chucked it at Kagome's quivering form five seats down. Her eyes met his in surprise.

"You look like you need it," was his curt explanation.

She hesitantly wrapped the too-large piece of clothing round her upper body. Her shivering abated slightly.

"Thank you."

"Hn."

_'Minimal contact minimal contact minimal contact…'_

Inuyasha repeated the chant mentally. Kagome, however, was the one who broke the silence a few minutes later.

"I'm sorry, I must not be giving you the best of impressions right now. I assure you Kouran was meant no harm. She's my…bodyguard."

She let out a humourless chuckle, knowing that she must have sounded about as believable as a flying pig with antlers. Hazel eyes dropped to stare bewilderedly at her shaking hands.

"That's strange. I won't stop shivering." 

Inuyasha shrugged. He figured the best way to maintain 'minimal contact' was to minimize any interaction with the girl. And if that meant not talking then so be it. The end-of-lunch chimes sounded and Kagome turned to him once more.

"You don't have to stay here, you know. You've already done enough."

"Hn. Calculus is one class I can miss without regret."

_'Dammit!'_

Inuyasha was annoyed. He'd meant to stop talking! He shut his eyes. Maybe if he ignored her…

Kagome gave a small smile.

Who was this strange boy? She'd never seen him before but he'd come out of nowhere and helped her without any question. He was a student at Sengoku National that much was certain. It wasn't unusual for Kagome not to know a fellow schoolmate. She didn't particularly see the appeal of knowing _everything_ about everyone else and lacked the mindless-communication skills that Eri, the social butterfly possessed. The boy was easy on the eyes, she'd give him that, but it was no more so than some of the other males she'd met. His hair may have been somewhat longer than most guys, but Kagome doubted if she would have paid him any notice otherwise. She chanced a question.

"Are you new?" 

Inuyasha's eyebrow twitched. Why the hell did wenches always feel the need for conversation? He was in big enough trouble with his brother already.

_'Minimal Contact Minimal contact…'_

He offered small nod of his head, hoping she would be satisfied. As long as she didn't ask the dreaded question…

"So what's your name?" 

_'Damn!'_

Inuyasha pondered possible terms he could put into his will.

Let's see, he wanted to be buried, not cremated. His funeral was to be short but honourable. He wanted a simple headstone with something not too cheesy written across the top. Miroku was to deliver the eulogy. In normal circumstances, people usually passed on their assets to members of the family. But damn his luck if the only living family he had was a sibling who would probably be the one to end his life in the first place. Sesshoumaru's poison claws _hurt_, for Christ's sake!

He resorted to desperate measures.

_'Ha! I'm asleep! Take that noisy wench!'_

However, Inuyasha found that shutting out the rest of the world by closing one's eyes only made one's concentration all the more focused.

The gears in his mind started their relentless churning again.

What if the girl truly did possess miko powers, his little mind got down to wondering. When he'd first seen her in the stairwell, she'd looked scared and bewildered, as if she herself had no idea what had just taken place. Judging from Kouran's wounds, the blast had been unfocused and haphazard.

_'She can't control her powers.'_

Inuyasha's final conclusion made sense.

* * *

Kagome had given up trying to make conversation with the new kid. All she'd done was try to be friendly, as was custom, to the stranger who had done her a huge favour. But he seemed intent on ignoring her very existence. She wondered what was going through his mind. 

_'Not much, probably.'_

He seemed like the type who didn't much carefor the going-ons around him.

_'Slacker. Great! With any luck, he won't make a big deal out of this. It's just a way for him to miss class, after all.'_

His blazer around her was warm and comforting. Kagome was grateful for that small fact. To her, the boy's cold behaviour was a breath of fresh air.

Most people kept their distance because they were uncertain of how to deal with her. For the past three weeks, inquiries about Kagome's well-being had been common. But offers to help her had not. By constantly going, 'I'm sorry about your father' or 'Are you alright?' people hoped to keep her at a safe distance from themselves, but at the same time wanted to prove that they were indeed concerned for her. To be sympathetic towards the grieving was, after all, a 'morally correct' thing to do. Their goodwill mostly ended there, though.

Because by going so far as to ask something like, 'Is there any way I can help?' would mean having to take a part of her burden upon themselves and neither Kagome's school mates nor her teachers nor anyone else she'd come into contact with since her father's death, had ever been willing to offer such a thing. After all, no one liked to have to deal with the sadness of others. Humans had a natural desire to protect themselves from negative emotions.

Kagome had accepted that fact a long time ago.

This boy, however, seemed to genuinely just…_not _care. He hadn't bothered with fake concern. He hadn't asked her if she was all right. Not once. He'd helped her with Kouran. He'd tossed her his blazer. He'd offered her what help he was _willing _to give. Nothing more. And to Kagome, that meant a lot.

After all, actions always did speak louder than words…

* * *

A rough hand shook her awake for the second time that day. She looked up blearily into the chiseled features of its owner's face. The gruff voice that accompanied this action sounded nonchalant, perhaps a little irritated. 

"Hey. Wake up. Doctor told me to take you to your room."

The doctor had done no such thing. Inuyasha just needed an excuse to be following her around.

Kagome glanced at the wall clock and realized that it was already five in the evening. Dinner would be served in an hour. Had the nameless boy stayed the entire time? Kagome smiled.

_'Lazy little bugger. Probably skipped the rest of his lessons too.'_

He'd let her keep his blazer the whole time she'd been asleep. For all his coldness, the boy had been kind. More so than most people had been for a while now.

"What about Kouran," she inquired.

"She's fine. Sleeping like a kitten," came the curt reply.

Kagome sighed in relief. But she couldn't bring herself to see her bodyguard now, guilty as she was for putting her into that awful condition. Not a word was exchanged the entire way back to Kagome's fifth storey dormitory. Inuyasha's stride was brisk. He was trying to get this over with as quickly as possible. He slowed occasionally when he felt that she was falling too far behind. His longer legs saw to it that he moved nearly twice as fast as she could.

A new bodyguard had already arrived and been stationed outside her room. Word sure got about fast.Once the guard came into view, Inuyasha turned to leave.

"Wait!" 

His shoulders slumped a little. Almost! He'd been _that_ close to getting away! _That_ close! He turned around guardedly. The girl was holding his blazer out to him.

"I - Um - You..."

She'd turned into a stuttering idiot. Kagome smacked herself mentally over the head.

"I mean… Thank you."

The pure, unblemished gratitude in her eyes was unnerving to Inuyasha . She wasn't supposed to react to him like this! Hell, as far as she was concerned, he wasn't even supposed to exist. He had to say something to deter her. Anything!

"Go to sleep. You look like hell."

There. That should do it. Oh, how floored she looked! Inuyasha praised himself for the smooth delivery of that statement. The coldness of it, the nonchalance, he _so_ deserved an emmy. No female liked being told that they were visually unappealing in any way. Now she would think he was a rude bastard and want nothing to do with him.

It was good that he had turned to leave immediately after talking for he would have been sorely disappointed.

Because a few seconds later, unbeknownst to him, for the first time in three weeks, Higurashi Kagome's smile reached her eyes.

* * *


	6. Fluffy's Findings

**_Puppet Without Strings_**

* * *

**Chapter 5**

Upon entering the abandoned Higurashi mansion, Sesshoumaru's first instinct was to turn and run. The air was so saturated with the pungent smell of dried blood that his nose scrunched itself up against his will in repulsion. Memories from the war returned to assault his mind at full-throttle as he crossed the large expanse of floor to get to the staircase.

Crisp, white outlines in the shape of human bodies marked each and every place that a corpse had once lain. Sesshoumaru paused in his ascendance to examine two of these marked-out shapes on the mansion steps. The blood on the carpet had pooled out in almost-even, circular puddles, located around the torso area of each marking. Sesshoumaru noted this similarity in every corpse marking he passed as he neared the level where President Higurashi had once resided.

It did not take a genius to figure out what this meant. The people who had once lain within those outlinings had met their demise in one swift go. The shape and location of the bloodstains denoted that a single hit to the upper left torso each was all it had taken to send them to the next world. Their pain had not been drawn-out. And while this fact would have presented some semblance of relief to a sympathetic few who knew of the wasted deaths, all it meant to Sesshoumaru was that the president's killer had been highly-skilled and deathly efficient. A great complication to be overcome.

The security block was in a separate building to the mansion near the main gate. Sesshoumaru had seen it. Every single individual present there during the night of the murder had been killed.

So, using what knowledge he had gained from surveillance videos and his own deductions, Sesshoumaru proceeded with a mental reenactment of the night of the murder.

_The killer had, first and foremost infiltrated the grounds and silenced the staff in the security room. The men in that room were meant to be the eyes of the entire security staff. Their absence ensured that the guard unit in the mansion would have no way of knowing where the intruder would be until they could see him with their own eyes. By then, it would be too late._

This again proved how well thought out the operation had been.

_That taken care of, the assassin had entered the mansion._

Where from, remained uncertain but Sesshoumaru chanced that it had been from somewhere on the eastern vicinity of ground floor.

_He'd run through the halls, keeping to the shadows._

Apart from his family, one body-guarding unit and a general security personnel, part of the president's housekeeping staff had also been hired to maintain the mansion. They'd been housed on the ground level of the building.

_Witnesses might have proven a liability and so the killer had entered every occupied room on the ground floor and murdered their occupants._

The grand marble staircase Sesshoumaru had just ascended had been the only one in the building and therefore the only one that led to the Higurashis' sleeping quarters.

_It had been inevitable that the assassin had met resistance there. By that time, the bodyguards had been on full-on alert because of the null-responses from the security room. They'd opened fire on the assassin but he'd…_

Sesshoumaru still frowned upon the ludicrousness of the next fact.

_…he had either dodged or not been affected by the bullets. Because in less than a few seconds of each other, both guards fell to the floor dead by his hand. He'd continued down the hallway with the stealth and speed similar to that of moving air._

As Sesshoumaru progressed down the corridor, he passed more chalked corpse outlines. The video camera overhead was still in tact. He remembered what it had recorded.

_Two more bodyguards had met him in the stretch of distance between the staircase and the president's room. He'd disposed of them without so much as a pause in his forward movement._

Expertly dodging every blotch of blood on the mansion's extravagant carpeting proved an effortless task. Sesshoumaru paused at the threshold of President Higurashi's room before stepping in to survey the interior. A splatter of blood on the mahogany of the room's double doors painted a morbid and unsightly picture. This marked the area President Eiji had stood in front of when he'd been shot. He spied another spot in the center of the grand room where two more large bloodstains converged into one. The chalk drawings over them had been made one on top of the other.

_The assassin had been so fast that the guard personnel hadn't had a chance to sneak the President out of his room to the concealed fire escape in front of Higurashi Souta's Room. They hadn't even had time to regroup. _

_The next best alternative was opted for. They'd locked the President in his room, assembled in pairs and separated._

Sesshoumaru was not unfamiliar with this tactic. Meeting an opponent in successive waves tired the enemy out in most cases. The strongest of the team would be stationed closest to the protected. This was so that in the unlikely event that the first few waves of guards did not manage to take down the aggressor, the protected would still be well-defended.

But the guard unit hadn't known that the extent of this assassins abilities.

_The two that were guarding President Higurashi in his room had been youkai. One of them had pushed the man to the floor in the middle of his room, away from windows and the door, and crouched over him to shield his body with his own. They'd focused their senses on the double doors of the room, ready to open fire if the intruder did get pass their comrades in the hallway._

Sesshoumaru had outstanding memory and had had nearly every detail of the assassination report memorized. He sifted through it in his head, then shot a glance at the room's one broken window. The curtains that hung beside it fluttered with the morning breeze.

_But the intruder hadn't come through the door._

_No sooner had the gunshots stopped that he raced through the room adjacent to the president's and used the ledge above its window to swing himself onto the balcony of the president's room.-_

Sesshoumaru examined the splintered window pane. The glass was thick, almost unbreakable. Most individuals probably should not have been able to break through these enforced panes and judging from the height and small stature of the assailant, he should have been no exception.

But he _had _gotten through. This was no normal person. The evidence was pointing increasingly to the killer being of demon-blood.

_The momentum from the killer's next swing proved enough to propel him clean through the pane of one locked window. The demon crouching over the president barely had time to fling him away before the attacker was upon him._

Sesshoumaru noted the untouched condition of the room's furniture.

_The youkai guards, even with their superior power, hadn't proven much more of a challenge than the humans had._

It troubled Sesshoumaru to a degree. He frowned at the President's corpse outline just before the door.

_The President hadn't so much as been able to turn his door handles before the killer raised his gun and fired, with deadly precision, a single shot to the man's mid-left chest. He'd then left through the very doors the President had been intent on using._

This noted, Sesshoumaru continued on down the hall towards the childrens' rooms. He walked until his sensitive nose picked up a familiar scent and stopped over the dried red-brown stains ahead of Higurashi Kagome's bedroom doors. The blood that had once run here had belonged to his old comrade.

The bloodstains that Hizashi Kouga had left, however, did not resemble the rest of the murdered victims. While the others had bled in a concentrated single area, Kouga's blood left disordered splatters all over some ten meters of the hallway floor. Sesshoumaru crouched at what he thought was the exact spot Kouga had first clashed with the assassin.

Now, Sesshoumaru was, by nature, a solitary individual. A lone-wolf so to speak. However, if there were one person that he would grudgingly oblige to working with, it would have been the wolf demon, Kouga. Before this assassin, Sesshoumaru had been undoubtedly sure that his dark-haired compatriot was _the_ fastest being on two legs in the entire planet. That title not only pertained to the speed with which the wolf could run, but also to his unbelievable reaction time.

For all his strength and cunning, speed was the one area Sesshoumaru knew he would never best Kouga in. Sesshoumaru found the spot on the ground that the assassin's gun had once lain.

_While the killer had been somewhat distracted by Kouga's human bodyguarding partner, the wolf demon had made his move. The killer, never expecting such a burst of raw speed, had paused in confusion as Kouga had just about disappeared from view. This small weakness was all the wolf had needed to knock the weapon from his unsuspecting hand. Never pausing even to take a breath, he'd then proceeded with a barrage of assaults to the killer's smaller body, all of which were promptly dodged and returned._

Sesshoumaru frowned. Even Kouga's swiftness hadn't been enough to take the bastard down. He'd watched the scene from one of the surveillance videos.

_The two had exchanged blow for arduous blow, neither receiving nor landing a hit for the first minute of fighting. They'd kicked off walls, nearly slammed through ceilings, destroyed what little furniture that had been present in the hallway, during which time, Kouga had demanded for Higurashi Kagome to take her brother and escape while he held the intruder off. The president's daughter had hesitantly obliged. Sensing that his targets were fleeing, the assassin had strengthened his assault. Kouga had been gradually driven further and further back._

Even through the distorted black and white of the video, Sesshoumaru had been able tell when Kouga had steadily started to tire. And then, the fatal mistake had been made.

_Kouga had chanced a fleeting look in the direction in which the daughter had gone to gauge her position. That had been his downfall. His attacker had used that small distraction to do a feint, which Kouga had promptly fallen for. He'd received a powerful kick to his midsection that sent him careening into the door of Kagome Higurashi's room behind him. The killer had taken advantage of Kouga's brief incapacity to pull out a secondary weapon._

The hunting knife had been what caused the arched lines of blood splatters all over the carpet.

_Having had no weapon of his own, Kouga had relied on his claws to defend himself with. The six-inch blade, however, served to give the killer a sizeable advantage over Kouga's shorter claws._

Sesshoumaru knelt over a long, slightly arched splatter of blood.

_The slash had been wide and powerful. It sliced open part of Kouga's forearm. The next one landed on his left shoulder. The interval between each subsequent injury after that had become smaller and smaller. Finally, a last and most critical swipe managed to open up a good portion of Kouga's right thigh._

His speed had gone clean out the window after that.

Further down the hall saw Sesshoumaru examining the remnants of blood from where Kouga had been downed.

_The assassin hadn't had time to finish him off. The second Kouga had crashed to the floor in pain, he'd taken off after the children._

But the wolf was to be not so easily pushed aside.

One of the reasons Kouga had gained Sesshoumaru's hard-earned respect back in the days of war had been the ardent determination that he possessed. Such potency of this trait had only been seen by Sesshoumaru in one other individual. It was the reason he treated Kouga like a brother. Because in a strange sort of way, the wolf reminded him somewhat of Inuyasha.

_Wounded and bleeding profusely, Kouga had somehow managed to pull himself off the blood-soaked ground and stumble after the killer as fast as his gashed leg and battered body would let him._

_It had taken only a minute for the killer to locate the Higurashi children and even less of that time to close in on them. They had been nearing the parking lot of the mansion's exterior._

Once they had the advantage of wheels it would have been impossible to catch them, even with the killer's superior speed. And according to that area's surveillance video, they'd almost made it too.

_He reached them before they got to the car park. In a desperate attempt to save her brother, the girl had shielded him with her own body. The killer had charged at her._

_She'd screamed._

The surveillance camera in that area had only picked the scene up from a distance. They hadn't been close enough to the parking lot for the picture to be clearer. But it was sufficient for Sesshoumaru to make his deductions.

_The tip of the blade had been just a few short inches from her when Kouga, claws poised and arm locked had ploughed into the killer from the side._

How the wolf had managed to pick up such momentum in his feeble state had been a wonder. One second the killer had been running in the children's direction, and the next, he'd been sprawled under the wolf demon several feet away. The huge smear of blood on the gravel floor had just about been weathered away by nature. But the bright yellow evidence marker told Sesshoumaru the exact place the two had fallen.

Now this was the part that still puzzled Sesshoumaru.

_For reasons unknown, Kouga's claws had managed to embed themselves into the assassin's left side. The wolf had somehow been able to damage a suit capable of withstanding the force of a dozen speeding **bullets.**_

What puzzled Sesshoumaru more than that though, was the fact that the assassin had up and run after taking the hit. It was painfully obvious that Kouga had been spent to the marrow after that last desperate assault. He'd fallen to the floor and never gotten up again. The children would have been sitting ducks had the killer so chosen to stay and finish the job.

Instead, he'd fled. He'd run back to the mansion, grabbed the fallen gun and simply… fled.

Sesshoumaru had tried time and time again to think of a logical explanation. Had the suit held some sort of significance to the user? The children had been unarmed. It was illogical to think that the killer had felt at all threatened by them. So why?

There was something. Something crucial that he had missed.

A twig snapped somewhere. Sesshoumaru swung his gaze in its direction to catch a fleeting glimpse of something brown moving away from the iron fencing.

An intruder.

Sesshoumaru checked himself in time to stop a few choice profanities from leaving his lips, as he raced in the direction of the main gate. He'd been hanging around Inuyasha too much.

The mansion's outer fences had been fitted with ofuda charms to stop rogue forest youkai from entering the grounds. They would now serve as a hindrance to the demon lord-to-be. Clearing the five meters of fence would have been a breeze if not for their presence.

'Intruder alert. All personnel to sector 5B. They are to be detained at once.'

Sesshoumaru used the communicator on his wrist to alert the stationed guards. This place was supposed to be top-secret. If word got out that it had been cordoned off as a crime scene, then things could get ugly. The president was supposed to have died of heart failure after all.

By the time the guards had moved out, Sesshoumaru had already exited the main gate and was headed for the area he'd first spotted the trespasser. He saw the snapped twig and footprints in the mud. There had been two of them. He allowed a minute for his nose to grow accustomed to their scent. Then he was off in a flurry of white.

Further down the trail the two scents split. The intruders had taken different routes to throw him off. No matter, he'd go after one of them and send the guards for the other.

'Lieutenant Takehiko, take your men and scout sector 4A. One of two intruders escaped in that direction. I'll go after the other one. If there is a getaway vehicle I want it found.'

'Yes sir!'

Sesshoumaru ploughed through the woods, dodging branches and skirting roots. The bastard had run downwind. His or her scent was faint but Sesshoumaru had worked with worse before. He would not allow one mangy snoop to get in the way of his entire operation.

He violently cleared a low-hanging branch from his path and that was when he saw him. Or rather… her. The figure of an escaping woman a hundred yards north of him.

Sesshoumaru channeled youki into his right arm, willing his legs to propel him faster than they already were. The glowing cord that materialized into his firm grip stemmed from this powerful demon energy.

The woman had been running through a viscous puddle of mud when she felt the tip of his energy whip wrap round her soaked ankles. Her descent to the dirt was far from graceful.

Sesshoumaru had leapt the remaining distance and retracted his whip before making a poised landing in front of the her sputtering form. Even with a scorched ankle, the dark-haired woman had somehow managed to pull herself up and whirl her body round to face him. The verbal assault she launched was loud and unbefitting for a lady. The sight of her nearly brought a smirk to his serious face. An angry, wide-eyed female whose whole front half had been browned by mud was laughable at the very least.

'You fucking bastard! That hurt! I could have died!'

Ruby eyes were wide and heated and delicate nose, fuming. Sesshoumaru used his communicator to inform the guards of their whereabouts. They were coming for them.

In his mind, the wench should have been grateful. As much as he'd wanted to, he hadn't channeled even a tenth of his full power into the whip. She should have been glad that she'd been allowed the preservation of her feet.

'You have three seconds to identify yourself, your accomplice and your reasons for being on restricted territory. Do not attempt to lie your way out of this unless you are prepared to face dismal consequences.'

That only served to heighten the woman's fury.

'I don't have to tell you a damn thing! I know my rights!'

As quickly as it had vanished, Sesshoumaru's energy whip rematerialized and wrapped itself round her ankles. A slight flick of his wrist, and the woman was pulled forcefully to the ground once more. It wasn't just her front half that was dirtied now. Denim leg-coverings that had once been blue were now a sickly shade of dark brown. White, muscle tank top was now soaked through with disgusting russet liquid.

She sat up again, wincing. Sesshoumaru stood over her prone form, using his height as a means of intimidation, as if his death glare wasn't frightful enough.

'I will repeat myself only once more. Tell me who you are and what your intentions here were.'

The woman replied by splashing a sizeable lump of mud at his face. She launched herself to her feet and made to start running again but Sesshoumaru's patience had reached its limit.

She'd gotten in no more than two steps before the demon slammed her, face-first, into the earth. His clawed fingers reached for the pressure point at the back of her neck and within seconds, her squirming stopped.

Sesshoumaru was beyond aggravated.

_'Stubborn bitch.'_

He turned her body round and searched her pockets for some sort of identification. It was irksome, having to resort to such low methods. But the wench had left him little choice.

He found a black leather purse and sifted through its contents as his ears picked up the sound of his subordinates' approaching footsteps.

The writing on one of the cards made him curse.

'Fuumie Kagura,' it said, 'Minami Broadcasting Station - TV Four.'

_'The bitch is a reporter...'_

Sesshoumaru felt his mood plummet to hell.

* * *


	7. Fortune's Fool

**_Puppet Without Strings_**

* * *

**Chapter 6**

It was temperature that finally jolted Kagura awake.

Why was it so cold?

The hardness of metal beneath her body brought her fully to her senses. She picked herself up from the dirty ground. The chill in the surrounding atmosphere drew awareness to the damp condition of her clothing. Her temples throbbed with the effort of trying to remember where she was.

She felt goose bumps on her flesh when she crossed her arms with the intent of keeping them warm as her unfocused ruby eyes peered round the dark room, searching for a recognizable shape that they could adjust themselves to. She tried standing up to feel her way around but the pain that shot up from her ankles to her calves made the task difficult. She ran her hands down the offending appendages and winced when she touched raw skin. Her fingers came away sticky and covered with the metallic tang of coagulating blood. She wiped them on her soggy calf-long jeans in disgust, and realised that the action felt different from usual. She examined her fingers again.

Great. _Three_ broken nails.

She huffed in frustration. This was certainly shaping up to be a lovely evening. If it even _was _evening. She found it hard to tell when the damn room lacked a window where she could see the sky through. Hell, she'd even settle with an _opening_ of some sort. A chip in the wall or perhaps a hole in the ceiling. The sliding of a key through a lock caught her attention.

A _door_ would suffice! She forced herself to her feet, ready to negotiate her way out of whatever situation this was. For some one in her line of work, getting into sticky situations was far from unusual. She smoothed her hair back and straightened her top. It was still damp. Good, a little skin showing here and there would work wonders to her advantage if she were to be dealing with a male. She would rely on her amazing wit and impeccable charm to get her self out of current circumstances. This would be a breeze.

Then she saw who stepped through the doorway. And the day's events came flooding back to her in a single, massive torrent. Her face-colour changed to something between a hot pink and an angry red. If she were a cat she'd have been fully arched and spitting.

"_Y-You_!"

Amazing wit flew out the nonexistent window.

"You fucking son of a _bitch_!"

Impeccable charm went bye-bye.

If it were possible with a visage such as his, Sesshoumaru would have deadpanned. As it were, the capillaries in his face had already locked it into a position of inexpressiveness, and so he did no such thing. Reputations needed to be upheld after all. He opted instead for a single raised eyebrow and a well-rehearsed arrogant glare down his nose. He was adept at making people uncomfortable.

_'What is **wrong** with him!'_

Kagura was starting to feel extremely idiotic. She wondered if the phrase 'strikingly good-looking' was synonymous with 'emotionally dead'. The bastard's lack of reaction was justspoiling the aggressive atmosphere! When Sesshoumaru finally spoke, Kagura had to check herself lest she sighed in relief.

"Oh I'm sorry. Did you mean that as an insult?" Sesshoumaru quipped. His mother had been of dog-demon descent after all.

"What are you? _Stupid?_"

Sesshoumaru wasfar fromhappy. Jaken had just linked in with vexing news. Apparently, Inuyasha hadn't _listened _when his brother had ordered him to keep out of the Higurashis' attention radar. Sesshoumaru now had _that _to deal with _and _a seemingly impossible murder case to solve, _on top _of having to prevent a possible breach of classified information that could potentially lead to public unrest!

Sesshoumaru was not happy at all.

"That coming from the wench who tried to run with my energy whip still attached to both ankles? Then I assume the answer would be, '_No more than you._'"

Her reply was blurted without so much as a second thought.

"Ha! So you're admitting to being as stupid as I am!"

Kagura could have shot herself. Sesshoumaru responded without pause.

"And you're admitting to being stupid. Period."

The lights in the room had been lit. Sesshoumaru raised a poised hand and motioned for his men to enter. They brought with them a single aluminium chair and a table of similar design, which they placed at the centre of the room. Kagura found herself being forcefully pushed down by two of the men upon other piece of furniture.

"Get your filthy hands off of me!"

Kagura didn't like being touched. It was a characteristic that had been founded from one prior romantic relationship. Kagura growled. '_Romantic'_ would not be the word she'd choose to describe what the torturous fling had been. The soldiers' forceful grips on her arms had caused unwanted feelings of bitterness and anguish to surface. She felt her heart contract and start to pump faster. Squeezing her eyes shut, she exhaled and slowly counted to ten. It would do her no good to be shovelling up bad memories now. With them firmly closed, she did her best to channel the feelings of utter helplessness and frustration that had emerged from of her superfluous recollections, into pure, unadulterated anger.

Anger was the only potent emotion that Kagura would willingly allow herself to feel. It was a usable emotion, a safe emotion. Anger kept one free from hurt and sorrow for it drove away guilt and pain.

When she'd been lost and alone in the world, it had been anger that had been her sole companion and viable weapon. It had been the need for her anger to be heard that had earned her the title of journalist and reporter. It had been anger that had driven her to live the way she now did. Anger towards the man that had wounded her and anger towards the world that had shunned her.

After all… the one time she had allowed herself to feel anything but, all she'd gotten were shattered dreams and a broken heart. Chipped, painted nails nearly drew blood from their calloused palms. So tightly had she been clenching her fists.

And now, it would be anger that she was to take out on the man before her.

* * *

Sesshoumaru could sense the woman's change in mood. She'd gone from calm and composed to profanity-spilling irritated to suddenly impassive in 2 minutes _flat._ When she'd been shoved into her chair, the brief glimmer of fear that had flashed across previously fiery eyes had not gone unnoticed either. Violent anger now radiated off her being in forceful surges. 

Now Sesshoumaru, being the person that he was, had long grown accustomed to people feeling intimidated by his person. Sometimes, when they'd been unlucky enough to play the rare recipient to his fully unleashed wrath, they could become downright _petrified_. His demeanour and the way he responded to people had dictated this fact since he'd been a mere child growing up. He remembered, with slight revulsion, a time during his youth when a fellow schoolmate, twice his size, had wet his pants in absolute terror of him.

Sesshoumaru, however, was certainly _not_ stupid enough to have believed that _he _had at all been the cause of this particular woman's unexpected distress. If she had wanted to be scared of him, she would have chosen an earlier time than now to have shown it.

So, either Miss Fuumie had some _serious_ pent up emotions that needed to be unleashed or he'd be inclined to think that she had something very nasty that she was trying to hide.

Sesshoumaru exhaled quietly.

This was one of the reasons he hated dealing with females. They were so amazingly temperamental; so _emotion-driven. _Sesshoumaru loathed it. He remembered back in the days when his mother had still been alive, how she'd gotten random bouts of intense emotion that had nearly always driven his father mad with irritation. It had been pretty early in life that he'd reached the decision that females were troublesome.

He figured that getting this over with as quickly as possible would most likely be best. He still had many things on his agenda and having to deal with an irate female was most certainly not one of them.

"What the hell is _wrong _with you people! You injure me, you throw me in a freaking _box _to freeze my ass half to death and now you treat me like shit-"

Two large palms braced themselves on his side of the table as Sesshoumaru inclined his upper body slightly forward. This stance was meant impose an air of threat onto the seated woman before him. All other occupants left the room.

"If you're quite finished with your gibberish, I shall be inclined to proceed. You will answer my questions fully and without restraint on truth."

Sesshoumaru couldn't help the boredom that leaked from his voice. He'd made this speech countless times before, as was regulation.

"Whether I decide to let you go or not will depend on the consistency of your answers so I suggest you give me your utmost cooperation. Do I make myself clear? Now tell me how was it that you came to know about the Genrai Mansion."

Kagura seethed. This was _her_ breakthrough story! In the two years she'd worked as a small time reporter, never had something quite so controversial been encountered before. The recognition and the support she would receive from releasing such a story would be a sure fire way of earning a ticket out of this god-forsaken hellhole of a country. This was her _life_! God only knew how long she'd been waiting for an opportunity like this! This was _the _key to being wholly free from _**him**_! She was _not_ about to stand back and allow some arrogant, pretty boy _prick _take it away from her!

"I-"

She stopped herself. As much as she yearned to, yelling her lungs out would do her no good. She would have to keep a tight reign on her anger. She wracked her brains for a way she could get out of this. She remembered something her superior had told her before she'd taken her first assignment. Something about… playing dumb. Kagura sneaked a glance at the impassive face hovering before her. The bastard already questioned her intelligence. Why not capitalize on that misjudgement? It could work.

Pride be damned for now. She needed out.

"I didn't '_come to know about' _anything! In case you hadn't _noticed _mister, today is a Tuesday. Our news station's weekly environmental awareness report is due to be delivered _tomorrow._"

If his hair hadn't already been the colour it was, it would have turned snowy whitewith the amount of restraint Sesshoumaru was putting on his irritation.

"...Your point?"

Kagura released an overly-dramatic sigh of exasperation. She was convinced that she had the clueless-bimbo-reporter-act down _pat_. Making her voice sound merely annoyed was a difficult task when all she really wanted to do was kick some serious stuck up demon butt.

"My _point_, mister, is that I came out here today hoping to finish up my report on how the recent Genrai landslides have affected the soil and plant-growth in the area."

She was making this up as she went along. Her boss would back her up if they ran a check. She'd already told him she was onto something big. Besides, she knew the fat old geezer would do anything for a move up on their channel eight rivals. Plus, the tape _did _actually have some takes of scenery from previous shoots so she wasn't being _entirely_ untruthful. If anything, she was on a roll!

The white-haired dog demon spoke again.

"So let me get this straight. You and your camera man were doing a report about _landslides_ in the bushes, on private property, andatop perfectly flat land."

By now, he'd turned round and fixed her with a look of such scepticism and incredulity that she had to stop herself from jumping up and punching him square in the face. She stopped herself just in time. After giving it a second thought, she decided that she could use this to her advantage. The way he was looking at her now told her that the _I'm-so-stupid _act had been bought hook, line and sinker.

"Hey listen here! It's not _my _fault that the idiot camera guy went and lost his fucking map. We had to do quite a bit of deep forest trekking for this story and we got _lost _god damn it! Excuse _us _for trying to find help from the only semblance of civilization available in the entire god-forsaken forest!"

"That still does not explain what you were doing in the bushes behind…my family's home."

Kagura nearly laughed at the man's attempt at cover-up.

"We were scoping the place out! It's a _big _house you know. There could have been like… guard dogs or something roaming around. We only ducked into the bushes because _you _came out. No offence buster, but you don't exactly _radiate_ warmth and hospitality!"

The dog demon, obviously feeling less threatened by the "dumb reporter" turned to prop his back against opposite wall. His eyes were closed and Kagura could vaguely see the slight twitch of his eyebrow due to extreme annoyance. The lids of his eyes remained closed even when he spoke next.

"Why did you run?"

"I _told _you. I thought there would have been guard dogs. You looked so very angry when you turned to face us. We were just surprised that's all."

Sesshoumaru fished out a dark video cartridge from within his suit pocket. He stalked up to the table and held the device in front of Kagura's face.

"And your video cartridge? Why are there shots of our house in it?"

Kagura was glad. At least her cameraman hadn't talked. She hadn't told him much about the story she was covering and hadsworn him to silence before they'd gone their separate ways in the forest.

"Muso was trying to use his camera to zoom in on your house. We couldn't see much from outside the fence. I don't know! The idiot must have still been recording or something. He's new, you know! Why the _hell _are you getting all worked up about a few random shots of your house anyway!"

Sesshoumaru frowned.

"Our family values its privacy."

With that he crushed the cartridge in his strong grip. Kagura wasn't worried. The station's cameras always sent backup shots to the news van. She could just retrieve the video from it later. But of course she felt she needed to play her part.

"HEY! What the- That's my whole report!"

Sesshoumaru didn't give a damn. He was already leaving the room. He was tired and hungry and he did _not _want to have to put up with the likes of Fuumie Kagura any longer than he had to. He wouldn't have to worry as long as all evidence had been destroyed and he was very sure he'd gotten rid of everything.

He ordered the guards to release her.

Kagura had to keep from flipping the arrogant bastard off in triumph. As she and Muso were escorted away from the dark holding cells, she realised that they had been housed in one of the guards' makeshift barracks. When one of them told her it was a "_temporary housing due to renovations being made to the mansion_", she pretended to buy into it. They were ushered all the way back to their work van which, unbeknownst to her had already been searched thoroughly by Sesshoumaru himself.

Kagura was elated. She was so close to freedom, she could practically taste it on the tip of her tongue. Only when they were back on city roads, an hourfrom the Genrai Hills and _far_ away from the bastard of a dog demon, did Kagura offer herself the liberty of flipping the screen of the van's data processing unit on. While it took its time loading, Kagura glanced at the clock on the cartridge reader. 21:25. Maybe they'd even make it in time for the ten o'clock news. Kagura was hopeful. A prompt came up on the screen for her password, which Kagura impatiently keyed in. Despite this small annoyance, she could not help the rare but genuine smile that her lips had been pulled into.

* * *

Muso had had his eyes on the road like every law-abiding driver should when a spine-tingling scream from behind caused him to nearly lose control of the vehicle. The triggering of his seatbelt's automatic locking mechanism had been the only thing that saved the distraught cameraman's head from smashing into the roof of the van above it. Muso thanked the lord that it had been fairly late on a Tuesday night when traffic had been extremely light. The widely swerving vehicle across several highway lanes might have encountered some pretty nasty damages otherwise. He hastily pulled up onto the side of the motorway and swung his body round to face the back of the van. 

"What the fuck, Kagura! What's wrong!"

The sight of the woman in question caused him to back off. She was hunched over the video screen with both hands braced on either side of it. Her head was bowed and her eyes hidden by fallen bangs. Her shoulders were shaking. Muso caught the slightest whisper of a curse.

"-at bastard. That _fucking _bastard..."

Her whispering grew louder with each repeat of that phrase and Muso decided that he was feeling extremely uncomfortable now. He nearly jumped in surprise for the second time that evening when Kagura's soft voice, laden with cold malice, turned on him next.

"Muso. Take me home."

"But I thought you wanted to go back to the sta-"

"**_NOW_**, Muso!"

He couldn't argue. The woman was scary enough as it was. This change in attitude made him want to sink as low as he could into his leather seat. He obliged with her request, if only to get himself away from her as quickly as possible.

* * *

When Kagura made to unlock the door of her two-bedroom apartment she didn't slide the key into the lock. She stabbed it in, as if she were imagining that the doorknob were a certain white-haired dog demon's heart. When she entered her apartment, she didn't swing the door shut either. She smashed it closed with a well-placed kick. The light switches weren't flicked on, they were hammered on. 

An unfortunate flower vase that had done no wrong other than exist close enough for Kagura to reach, found itself sailing swiftly through the air. Creamy porcelain shattered into a hundred smaller bits on the opposite wall, their one consolation being the fact that they would not suffer brokenness alone. One clock, eight books,fifteen compact disks, and a designer lamp joined the jagged shards in pieces of their own.

Kagura let out another scream.

Why were the fates so against her! Had she committed some sort of inexplicable _sin _in her past life? She still remembered what had appeared on the data processing screen when she'd tried to recover the shots of the Higurashi Mansion.

"Requested file, _Genrai, _not found."

She'd run countless checks to determine its whereabouts. She'd even printed off the computer's record lists. It had been one particular detail on the sheet that had caused her to lose control.

"File _Genrai. _Deleted on _02/06_ at _20:32_"

The dog demon bastard had done it. She knew he had. He'd left her with absolutely nothing! Kagura cursed herself for letting her hopes rise as high as they had today. She thought she'd learned _that _lesson a long time ago! It was a basic rule in life!

The higher things rose, the harder they fell.

Kagura stood with fists clenched and head bowed in the centre of the living room she had just trashed. Try as she might, the black haired woman couldn't stop tears of frustration gathering at the sides of her eyes. She had been so close! _So _close…

**"_What's the matter Ka-gu-ra?"_**

It was said without an ounce of concern.

Kagura's heart nearly slammed itself out of her chest.

_'No! It can't be...'_

Ruby eyes grew wide and panicked. Their owner whirled round to face what she thought was the source of the taunting voice. She saw naught but a shattered vase and fallen lamp.

**"_Oh my, Kagura. Are those tears I see?"_**

That voice...How was it possible!

_'Oh God, please no!'_

The voice was to her left now. The way it said her name in that singsong manner made her spine go rigid. She hastily scrubbed at her eyes as they paused from their frantic darting around the room. No! Why now! After two full years, she'd thought that he'd-!

_**"That's simple Kagura. You thought wrong. I missed you so very much during my absense. Did you miss me?" **_

The voice now hovered beside her ear, its owner seeming to have read her thoughts. She could feel the cool flit of breath across the side of her face. Strong hands on her shoulders prevented her from facing its source. Her breathing had become heavy and irregular. The feel of a taller body pressing up against her back made her frame stiffen in alarm.

_**"It would seem, Kagura, that you had a little mishap today. How very unfortunate for you."**_

"Let go of me."

Her voice sounded close to pleading. It was uncharacteristic of her to take so mildly to another's touch.

_**"I'm afraid not Kagura. After all, I own you."**_

The fear that'd had Kagura's heart clenched within its unyielding grip was momentarily overridden by newfound anger that stemmed from her hearing these words.

"You do _not _own me, you bastard! I got away from you once and I can _damn well_ do it again!"

From any other person, the laughter that was emitted could have been mistaken for playful teasing.

**"_Well, well. It's been two years and you're still as amusing as ever."_**

One pale hand left her shoulder and hovered in before her neck. Kagura's skin crawled when its fingers applied the barest of pressure to the smoothness of her throat.

"What the fuck are you talking about?"

**_"Kagura, Kagura, Kagura. You never were the brightest of companions. Did you think that the lack of men guarding your room the day you escaped was some sort of lucky coincidence? Did you think getting the job you have despite your lack of experience was due to divine intervention? Come now, I thought you'd be more pessimistic than that! Despite what you've led yourself to believe, you never really were free from me. Not then, and certainly not now."_**

Kagura wanted to whirl round and hit him. But her body would not respond. She hadn't meant it. But her reply sounded weak and unsure.

"Y-you're a lying piece of shit."

_**"Now, now Kagura. Is that any way to speak to the man wholed you to your **great** Higurashi story?"**_

No! He couldn't have…

"You fucking liar! I found that out myself!"

**"_Did you now? Well then I suppose you would have done _**_all **that research even **without_ _**that anonymous tip from your website telling you of recent real estate sales."**_

It couldn't be! Her finding out about the mansion had been entirely accidental! She'd placed an inquiry on the information-seeking section of her company's internet site and had gotten an anonymous response from a member of the public. Their company paid for reliable information. People wrote in all the time to get free cash! It hadn't been anything unusual. She hadn't given it a second thought even as she'd hacked into Tokumi Real Estate Agency's private files and chanced across the sale documents of the Genrai Mansion.

**"_I always did have great faith in your skills as an information gatherer. I had all the clues laid out for you. I knew you would eventually find out about the case. You made me so proud, Kagura."_**

"N-no! I don't believe you."

She'd travelled up to the mansion out of mere curiosity after finding out it had been sold to the President just four days before his death. The first time round, that damned dog demon hadn't been there and she'd managed to scope the place out unnoticed. She'd been able to piece together sufficient information for her to realise that the president's death had been more than it seemed. She'd only gone back a second time to get shots of the place on video. But her damnable luck had seen to it that she'd chosen the wrong day to do it. The bastard behind her _had _to be lying!

But then… how would that explain how he seemed to know her every move?

**_"I was just about ready to sit back, relax and watch you expose the cold, hard truth to the many happy citizens of Sengoku…"_**

Kagura couldn't speak. If anything, her breathing grew shorter and more laboured. The hand at her throat had risen to cup her chin. It tilted her head to the side. She didn't fight it. She couldn't.

_**"But then the story never did air on tonight's news and the people remain blissfully unaware of it. You getting yourself caught, Kagura. I find that rather... degrading, don't you? It makes me rather **disappointed** in you."**_

The left side of Kagura's face was facing the ceiling. Cool lips pressed themselves somewhere above her left ear. A slender hand had moved to cup her right cheek while the other had taken its former place around her neck. It ran, with frightening slowness, long fingers past her exposed collarbone. They began to dip lower.

"Stop it!"

Kagura was blatantly struggling now. Somehow, she managed to break free from the figure's embrace and whirl her body around to deliver a sound punch to his face. At least, she would have, had her fist not been caught by his first. The grip round her neck became choking. Kagura found herself being unceremoniously lifted off her feet and slammed into the wall beside her. The face below her was one that she had seen only in nightmares and bad memories these past two years. She clawed at the vice-like hand that held her as her lungs screamed for air.

**_"I will make myself clear, Kagura. I let you off the first time you escaped because I found that you on the outside would be beneficial to me. I thought that by showing you the Higurashi case, you would help me expose it to Sengoku. However, I was wrong in assuming that you would be able to accomplish something so significant. You always did have a knack for screwing up your assignments."_**

Kagura's vision was starting to fade. Yet somehow, she welcomed the escape. Her tormentor's voice rang loud in her ears.

_**"I am willing to let you off just once more. Now, you **will **be exposing this case for what it is and you will be doing it without jeopardising me. You will either succeed, or face punishment by my hand. Believe me Kagura, there are a lot worse things than death and I will **not** tolerate another failure from you."**_

Just as Kagura was sure she would black out from lack of oxygen, the grip around her neck loosened and she fell to the ground in a heap, coughing and inhaling deeply.

**_"Know this, Kagura. Your life always has and always will be in my hands and nothing you do will ever change that."_**

Kagura's tears flowed freely now. Her tormentor crouched beside her and ran his fingers through her dampened hair. She reared back in abhorrence.

"Why? Why _me_! Why not do it yourself and _leave me be_!"

The man above her smiled a frightening smile.

**_"Because, my dear Kagura. I don't exist."_**

* * *


	8. Inuyasha's Wheel of Life

**_Puppet Without Strings_**

* * *

**Chapter 7**

The scratch of chalk over smooth slate forged a patterned rhythm that echoed in the silence and imprinted itself onto Inuyasha's consciousness. The multiple slides of various other writing instruments across the surfaces of nineteen note pads around the twelfth grade classroom added their own unique intonations to the overall harmony of the history lesson. Inuyasha himself had never been a good team player and had naturally opted for non-conformity. His history notes saw not a single word copied off the black board ahead. It instead comprised of a variety of random doodled images; Guns and knives, grenades and blood, claws and fangs. All of which had been created when he had still been _somewhat_ concentrating on the lesson. As of five minutes ago, his attention span had been wholly depleted and he now settled for counting the hairs on Jaken's, oh excuse him, _Professor _Jaken's balding head to pass the time. He gave up at twenty-seven when he realised he'd double-counted a couple of them.

The greying strands in question flicked to the side when Jaken turned round to address his class.

"And that would be all I have for you today. Do you have any questions?"

Inuyasha perked up. Jaken had stopped writing on the black board! That would mean that the lesson had come to an end and soon he'd be free to frolic as he pleased.… Back to resuming his guarding duties, that is. The happy thought was somewhat dampened by that little fact. Somewhere to Inuyasha's right, a pudgy hand lifted into the air.

"Yes, Tanaka-san?"

Inuyasha had a good mind to chuck his pencil sharpener at the boy three seats across. What on earth _more _could the idiot want to know about a damn event that happened two decades ago! Jaken's notes could have practically filled up a black board and a half!

_'Fucking grade-grubber.'_

It was understandable that the students at this academy were a tad more competitive than normal. Considering most of their parentages, Inuyasha was willing to bet that they'd all been pushed to perform at their best since they'd been in diapers. His lips emitted an inaudible growl as he plonked his cheek upon an upraised right palm. Through the open window, he watched as Higurashi Souta played soccer out on the field with his physical education class. For the third time that lesson, Inuyasha cursed himself for being the age he was. The nine-year olds outside looked happy in their over-sized soccer shirts and mud-soaked shin guards. Inuyasha wished he could be out there playing sport too. Hell, even the _ball_ looked less miserable than he was feeling now, despite having been kicked around pretty roughly by energetic youngsters.

"-ince they knew that demon blooded soldiers were so strong, I simply don't understand why the government couldn't have just introduced conscription at the start of the war to get as many as they could to fight. The conflict wouldn't have had to last for as long as it did then."

Inuyasha swallowed a scoff. Sometimes, he found it hard to understand how some of the brightest youths in all of Sengoku could be so amazingly narrow-minded. He'd come to realise in his time at SNIE, that intelligence did not necessarily incorporate awareness. He simply couldn't believe how sheltered some of these students were.

Jaken spoke his response without so much as a hitch. It was incredible how the wrinkled toad could be so damnably patient with other students when he was an absolute monster to Inuyasha himself. If it had been himself up there, the sheer _ignorance _that the question had portrayed would have driven him insane.

'_Hn. The old fart just likes to show off how much he knows that's all.'_

"Ah, but you are forgetting, Tanaka-san that back then, youkai neither viewed themselves as subject _to_ the government's authority _nor _obeyed Sengoku's laws. Sure, _politically_ it was seen as such, but in the hearts of the people, our two races might have just as well belonged on completely different planets. You would _never _have seen a human person associating with demons or vice versa. During the first few years of the war, my kind kept entirely to ourselves. We viewed the conflict as a human problem and so, chose not to interfere."

The Tanaka kid still looked puzzled.

"But if youkai did not comply with the rules of our nation then why hadn't they been extricated from the land even before the war began? How could they still have been living on Sengoku soil when they hadn't technically been part of the rest of Sengoku? Didn't the government care?"

Inuyasha couldn't contain his scoff this time. It came out a little louder than had been intended. A few curious eyes turned on him. The pair that belonged to Jaken looked irritated. His voice turned gruff when he addressed the hanyou.

"Do you have something to _add_, Nishijima-san?"

It took Inuyasha's daydreaming mind a second or two to process that the name that had been spoken was in fact, supposed to be his. He tore his gaze from the window and turned it towards the class. He cringed when he saw that all eyes had been fixed onto him. Of course being Inuyasha, he issued them a glare of his very own. But when the expectant gazes did not waver, he came to realise that his classmates were waiting for an answer.

He heaved an irritated sigh before turning to the boy who'd spoken previously.

"Yo Takuya-"

"Tanaka!"

"Whatever. Let me ask you something. Have you ever _tried _reasoning with a demon against his will before?"

"I...well."

He took the silence that followed as a reply in negative.

"Hn. Thought so. Well, simply put, it's _impossible. _When it comes down to it _no one _would have been able to tell the youkai what they should or should not have done. Did it ever cross your mind that us humans would never have stood a chance against the demon kind if we had tried to make them leave?"

The Tanaka boy looked offended.

"But there weren't many youkai in existence back then! I mean even now, they only make up a very small minority..."

Inuyasha rolled his eyes.

"Yes. And _that_ would be because most youkai had already been killed off after humans first settled here.We hunted them for what, two hundred years? The few youkai that still remained before the war would have been the ones that were powerful enough to survive. The ones that our ancestors didn't dare fight. There was no one to oppose them, so _of course _they would have continued living happily in Sengoku despite not giving a damn about its laws."

Inuyasha finished with a roll of his humanized eyes.

_'Who wants a freaking degree when all you really need common sense?'_

By this time, the room's occupants had been stunned to silence. The unexpected show of intelligence had obviously come as a great surprise. For many of the individuals present, it had been the first time they'd even heard the new boy speak. Most had simply passed him off as a typical loner slash trouble maker. One of those delinquent types whose rich parents had gotten so fed up with, that they'd dumped him off in SNIE for the sole purpose of kicking him out of the house.

Jaken's loud cough brought their attention back to the front of the room.

"Right, now that we've heard Nishijima-san's insightful speech, I shall be inclined to continue. Our focus today was supposed to have been the _causes _of the war. But since Tanaka-san has so kindly brought up this other issue, I shall tell you a little bit more about what we will be covering next lesson."

And continue he did. In monologue. Inuyasha wanted to die.

"In summary, Eiji Higurashi, who had been a colonel in the army then, had been the first one to acknowledge the need for demon cooperation in order for Sengoku not to have lost the war. He proposed a truce of sorts that was initially not taken very seriously."

Across the room, pens that had previously been stored away into their rightful cases were once again whipped out and put to work, their owners not wanting to miss even a smidgen of potential examination material.

"However, the marriage of an influential demon leader to the sister of then President Yamaoka Takemaru was what later brought Colonel Higurashi's proposed truce into the spotlight."

Jaken's voice had taken on such an edge of pride at this last comment that Inuyasha had to squirm. It scared him sometimes how much Jaken idolized his father and brother. Inuyasha found it unhealthy. For him, the mention of his late parents brought his gaze back out towards the school field.

"The rare interracial union between Lord Taisho and Miss Izayoi came with perfect timing. Before them, wedlock of such a nature had been virtually unheard of. As would have been expected, the responses to their decision to be togther were far from positive but despite the odds, they succeeded in introducing a controversial new idea to many of Sengoku's people. Both had been well loved amongst their respective kinds and so naturally, the marriage _and_ their influence saw to it that members from our two races started to re-question our dislike for one another. Many of us soon came to realise that our reasons for hatred had been on the whole, baseless. The couple lead by example and through them, Sengoku soon started to see that it was indeed possible for harmony to exist between human and demon kinds despite extreme differences. Heh. In their case class, I guess love really _did _conquer all."

While the position of his head remained unchanged, Inuyasha could hear more than see the reactions of love struck females around the room. A wistful sigh here; A feminine giggle there; A couple of whispered '_aww's' _diagonally across the room from him. He tried to shut them out. He tried to shut _everything _out.

His parents' courtship had been short. Their marriage spawned purely out of a sense of obligation towards their people. The hardship they had endured due to their selfless sacrifices had been real! It had been _painful._ And now here this little imp was, _degrading _their story; Making it seem like some sort of unearthly _fairytale _thatteenaged girls could coo about. Inuyasha hid his snarl.

"And so that, ladies and gentlemen, marked one of the major turning points in Sengoku's history. Demon involvement in the war effort soared after that and well, as you know, the rest is history."

Jaken chuckled at his little pun. He had consciously left out the fact that it had been the birth of the couple's first child, a son of human _and _demon blood, that had really sealed the truce and made it concrete.

Inuyasha's gaze was distant.

He hadn't thought of his parents in a long time. They'd left the world when he'd been a mere toddler. The first four months of his orphaned life had seen him placed in a home which he didn't quite remember.

Sesshoumaru had been made his legal guardian after that. A responsibility he had kept until a few days ago when Inuyasha had turned eighteen. Even at the age of four, the hanyou had still to have met his older half brother. He'd finally gotten the chance when Sesshoumaru had retrieved him after returning from the last remnants of fighting in the east. He'd had spent the rest of his pre-military life in his brother's charge.

SNIE's lunch chimes sounded somewhere in the distance and Inuyasha unthinkingly rose from his desk, slinging a red schoolbag over one shoulder. He barely avoided crashing into the person before him. So lost he was in his reminiscing.

He remembered how, at the age of eight, he'd been sent to the newly formed Sector So54 for _gifted _individuals, which catered to the employment of demonic and magic-handling persons into the military. That had been ten long years ago. Inuyasha hadn't been able to spend much time with Sesshoumaru after that. He'd always been too busy with his own assignments.

And now, here he was, pulled back under his brother's perfectionist authority. Life sure did have a funny way of repeating itself when you least expected it to. It reminded Inuyasha of the wheel of a car. Once every revolution, a single point on the tyre would always find itself rolling downwards again to be submerged in the adhesive sludge of the road it was on. Inuyasha felt currently, like _he _was at that unfortunate point on his wheel of life. Yes, he was in _deep _sludge. It was only a matter of time now before Sesshoumaru returned to pommel him for nearly breaking cover. Inuyasha currently felt as a lamb would while awaiting its time in the slaughter house…

But he'd be damned if he was going to get all poetic over the dilemma! Inuyasha shook his head to clear it of unwanted thoughts. Jaken was certainly having a negative influence on his psyche.

_'Wheel of life? What the hell's wrong with me? I knew the cafeteria lady put something dodgy in that pie.'_

What he needed was some fresh air and a nice, steaming bowl of ramen.

"Nishijima! See me after class."

Inuyasha grunted a response and continued walking, worn sneakers dragging themselves across varnished wooden floor tiles, headed for the doors.

Jaken bristled.

A sympathetic female student decided to lend a hand before the old toad's anger made him burst.

"Um… Nishijima-kun. It's after class _now._"

Inuyasha would have continued walking had Jaken not flung a piece of chalk at his head. The ramen bowls dancing around in his mind disappeared with sad little pops when the white object connected with the back of his skull. He turned around in reflex.

"Good to know that you aren't _entirely _numb-skulled, Nishijima. Get back here now."

Jaken really needed to lay off the wise-cracks. It was like he was trying to be _Sesshoumaru _or something. A shorter, wrinklier, _greener_ Sesshoumaru. With less hair. The thought left Inuyasha slightly sick. Jaken reminded him of old lady Kaede in a way. It must have been the toad's insatiable need to see Inuyasha suffer that lead him to make the connection. And there was also the fact that both were absolutely ancient but still very much single, though Inuyasha would readily admit that Kaede was a lot less taxing to look at than Jaken could ever hope to be. Maybe they were so nasty to him because they were both lonely and bitter. Inuyasha paused for a second. Come to think of it, they'd probably make quite a fitting couple. As quickly as that thought emerged, it was pushed aside. No, that wouldn't work. One could never be too sure about Jaken's sexual preferences; what with how enamoured the toad had been and still was with his brother. Inuyasha was about ninety-five percent sure he knew what the answer was.

"What's up, _professor?_"

He made sure to keep a safe distance from Jaken. He didn't want toad guts flying onto his newly pressed uniform when the geezer's head finally popped from anger.

"Watch that attitude boy."

"What attitude would you be referring to _Professor_?"

Inuyasha decided that it was fun being told off by a person one-third your own height. The most Jaken could do to him was maul his leg.

"What attitude _hanyou_? Why, the one with the damn superiority complex, of course! The one that screams for attention even when you're supposed to be lying low! _That _attitude is what the one I am talking about! What the _hell _was that all about just now? The last time _I _checked, showing off your knowledge to everyone around you had _not _been in the job requirements. You acted like some sort of attention-seeking five-year-old _brat._"

Inuyasha pretended to look affronted. Jaken continued in a smaller voice, made even softer by the fact that his teeth were firmly clenched.

"I've a good mind to give you hell's worth of detention. However, that would be impeding on your duties so I must regretfully refrain from doing so."

Inuyasha had the audacity to look a little smug. However, if he had been paying close enough attention to the shorter youkai, he would have seen the malevolent gleam that had entered his dark eyes. Perhaps Jaken's next bit of information would not have come as so much of a mood-killer then.

"I'll leave the _chastisement_ to Sesshoumaru-sama, instead. He'll be arriving tonight."

The resemblance to Kaede had become uncanny. Made more so when Jaken let out a throaty cackle after that sentence. Inuyasha couldn't have been more aggravated now. He had literally to clamp a firm hand down on his right leg. So strong had the urge to step on Jaken been.

"Hn. I'd say _Professor_, that you take far too much pleasure in that little fact. Either you really, really hate me or you must really miss my brother a lot."

If Jaken's skin hadn't been the dark shade it already was, Inuyasha could have sworn the little imp had blushed. He flung a piece of paper at the hanyou.

"Just you wait, brat. You'll be getting yours soon enough! Be at _that_ spot and that _exact _time! Now get out of my sight!"

Inuyasha smirkingly left the room.

Half way through lunch saw the half-demon slurping his seafood ramen distractedly atop an obscure limb of a large tree. After that incident with Higurashi Kagome in the stairwell, he knew he couldn't risk meeting the girl a second time. And so, he'd had to change his stake out location to another indistinct area of the school. He'd found the perfect solution to his plight in this tree. Its canopy was thick and hid him easily from anyone who might have been looking. That, plus the fact that this back area of the school was practically deserted, gave Inuyasha the privacy he so needed to do his job well.

Inuyasha held out his right palm. Upon it lay the cause of his current state of distraction.

The scrap of paper that held the details of his and Sesshoumaru's intended meeting point was plain and crumpled. To any other person, it would have seemed like just another piece of trash fit for nowhere other than the confines of a rubbish bin. In Jaken's over-stylized cursive, the note read, "_Shijun 2330"_

The place and time.

_Shijun. _Purity. Ironic really, that it was the name of a nightclub on the… _wilder_ side of town. Sesshoumaru sure knew how to pick them. Inuyasha had always secretly entertained the notion that his half brother wasn't as much of a prude as he made himself out to be. This confirmed it.

The hanyou ran over possible excuses he could make. Possible ways he could get out of the meeting unscathed. After some time, the proverbial idea-bulb brightened.

_'Wait a second! Nightclub equals bar, bar equals alcohol and alcohol… alcohol equals loss of soberness. Holy shit, that's **it! **Maybe if I get Sesshoumaru drunk enough...'_

He didn't get a chance to finish that thought. Because something below him caught his attention.

* * *

Kagome peered around from beneath her bangs with great caution. She tried not to do it too obviously. She knew it would be too conspicuous if she did. Her approach of thefigure standing near the large tree with his hands shoved into uniform pockets was soundless, if a little rushed. The boy glanced up and smirked when he saw her. 

"Heh. Never thought I'd be seeing you again, babe."

Kagome gave a weak smile.

"I never thought I'd come back but well… its been acting up again."

The boy pushed off the wall he had previously been leaning on. He walked until he stood in front of Kagome.

"Hn. All the better for me, eh? So then, how much do you want?"

Kagome pondered this for a second, then replied.

"Just two. Not that many right now. It's too risky."

The boy's dark head shook with suppressed laughter.

"Hn. Must be annoying being constantly followed around. I'm surprised you managed to get round your watch to come see me. My you're a sneaky one."

As he spoke, his hand snuck into the inner pocket of his blazer and fished out two small paper sachets. He held them out to Kagome. She reached for them.

"How much?"

The smirk was back now. He avoided her grasping fingers and slid the objects into the inner pockets of Kagome's school jacket himself. Nimble fingers switched them for her purse.

"For you, babe, ten thousand."

After the stated amount had been retrieved from the cream-coloured money holder. The dark-haired boy handed the purse back to Kagome, shoved his hands into hispockets once more and sauntered away.

"Nice doing business with you, babe," he called over his shoulder.

Kagome didn't bother with a reply. She'd gotten what she needed. The shower that she'd left on in the gym's changing room had been running for nearly ten minutes already. She had to get back quickly before her bodyguard got suspicious. As she rounded a last corner and climbed back through the shower room window, she failed to notice the pair of amber eyes that watched her from under creased brows.

* * *


	9. The Thrills of Espionage

_**Puppet Without Strings**_

* * *

**Chapter 8**

Kagome slammed through the bathroom doors and stumbled into the nearest available cubicle. Her legs were uncoordinated and her fumbling steps across the ceramic tiles created resounding thuds that echoed the pounding in her ears. The sound of the door creaking open once more forced her to push aside the want to stop moving entirely in favour of yanking the lock on the cubicle's door closed. She fell upon the grey toilet seat and buried a pale face in both hands, barely registering the sound of her own gasping pants. Clammy fingers became lost in tangles of damp, dark hair as they massaged their owner's temples in small circular motions.

"Headaches again, Miss Kagome?"

Kagome offered a nod of agreement, not caring that the woman outside hadn't been able to see it. That small movement alone had caused the hammering in her skull to intensify and she clamped her eyes shut in reflex. Coherent speech would return in a while, but just for now, silence would be her best companion.

Kouran seemed to accept this, and offered not a word more of question, merely stood watch outside the cubicle, quiet and unmoving. Some time later, when the agony was not threatening to pull her conscious mind into oblivion, Kagome would come to acknowledge that she had been grateful for the demoness bodyguard's discretion in not storming into the cubicle after her. She would thank her whole-heartedly when that time came.

To say Kagome had been surprised when Kouran hadn't simply thrown down her duties and quit would have been quite the understatement. The morning after that incident in the stairwell, Kagome had opened her room's door prepared to face the trials of another school day and nearly hit the roof in shock. On her doorstep the woman had stood in all her blue-haired, albeit somewhat beat up, glory, ready to resume her duties and acting as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.

Any apology Kagome had stuttered had been blatantly ignored and Kouran had simply continued with her contractual obligations as if she hadn't had the wind knocked out of her very being and been reduced to a smoking heap of flesh just fifteen hours prior. What puzzled Kagome the most was that instead of being resentful towards her charge, the cat demon had seemed, instead angry at _herself _for not being strong enough to withstand the blast. The awkwardness she'd felt towards Kouran had gradually been replaced with perplexed bewilderment. It had come to the point where Kagome had simply stopped trying to feel sorry for herself for losing control. She knew Kouran wouldn't have it.

All thoughts were cut short as another pulsing surge of energy pushed at Kagome's restraints from the inside. Quivering arms left their place in her hair to wrap themselves tightly round her torso, as if their presence there would stop the pain from tearing it apart. She had to end this now! Her mouth opened and closed several times as it tried to relay her current thoughts to her bodyguard.

"Kou-"

She fought down another wave of pain and breathed deep.

"Kouran, c-could you fill a basin for me? The cold water would do me some good."

The demoness in question complied wordlessly. Soon, the splash of running liquid from a tap outside Kagome's cubicle could be heard. Kagome herself used this chance to reach behind the lapels of her school blazer and pull out the small white packet she had purchased some hours ago.

The noise created by the running tap would mask the sound of ripping paper and Kagome hoped the strong smell of cheap pine would hide the scent produced by the drug inside it. Kouran's demonesque senses weren't things that the oldest Higurashi child could get away with underestimating.

It was difficult for her shaking fingers to fish a single tiny pill out from the confines of such a small sachet. She succeeded on her third go. With an urgency that stemmed from an instinctive want to be rid of pain, Kagome popped the tasteless black sphere into her mouth and swallowed.

The rushing of water outside had lessened to a resounding trickle. Kagome was glad that the pounding in her ears had receded enough for her to fully register that fact. By the time she emerged to face her protector, the painful hammering in her skull had softened to a dull throb and her shivering had subsided. She smiled gratefully at Kouran before plunging her hands into the filled basin. The water she scooped up and brought to her face was refreshing and she revelled in the feeling for a while.

Ever since that day in the stairwell, the foreign power within her had gone rampant. She'd had a second attack that very same day, not four hours after the nameless black-haired boy had left her standing in front of her dormitory. The pain had been a lot less than now, but every time it happened after that, Kagome felt like she was being torn up gradually from the inside. The force had intensified with each occurrence. The pounding in her head got stronger with the increasing effort she'd had to use in bringing herself under control. It was as if whatever was within her had suddenly grown too huge for her small frame to contain and was now threatening to break free.

But for the four days since the stairwell incident had taken place, never had one of these attacks happened at a time like this! The previous attacks, two in all, had come upon her mostly in the dead of night, when she'd either been asleep or very close to it. Kagome was certain now that they only occurred when she was mentally unprepared.

Sleep made her vulnerable because it put her in a different plane of consciousness. One she had no wilful control over and suppressing the strange, foreign energy within herself took a great amount of conscious restraint that she _could not_ possess during the hours of slumber. Kagome had been afraid to let herself so much as lie her body down these past nights. She hadn't wanted to risk losing control again. It now appeared that the frequent battles with exhaustion had returned to bite her square in the butt. She had let her guard down in a moment of fatigue and this had been the result. She prayed no one in the cafeteria had noticed her sudden change in demeanour before she'd rushed off to the bathroom.

At first, Kagome had stupidly hoped that she'd be able to fight off the forces that had injured Kouran herself. Where there was a will there was always a way right?

_What a load of bull…'_

Kagome wasn't usually a very cynical person. However, four days of involuntary insomnia tends to do bad things to people's outlooks on life. In that time, Kagome had come to realise how truly ridiculous she had been in thinking that she could've accomplish such a feat. No matter how much _will_ she possessed, her body would never be strong enough to withstand the pull of its own exhaustion. Caffeine could only help her so much.

After an intense inner conflict with her conscience, she'd decided that turning to the pills again would be her only viable option despite the problems they had caused her in the past. She still remembered the absolute disbelief that had been on her father's face when he'd found out about them. The argument that had resulted still haunted her dreams. Not that she'd been able to dream much lately.

The episode with Kouran in SNIE's eastern stairway had not been a first. Kagome had had those strange incontrollable surges of energy before. She recalled how terrified she'd been when she'd nearly severed Kouga's arm from himsix months ago during one of their playful self-defence sessions. Afterward, when he'd recovered and resumed his duties, the wolf had teased her about not knowing her own strength and had laughed it off like any macho male with a hurting ego would. He'd told her not to be so worried and had promised to keep it a secret from her father.

Kagome had calmed down well enough after that first time. But when similar occurrences started taking place after she'd returned to school, her fear had heightened ten-fold. She'd had occasional bouts of extreme pain, not unlike what she had just experienced, in which she'd struggled to keep herself under control.

It was natural to be afraid of what you didn't understand and afraid Kagome had been. She'd gone to as many doctors as was possible to without arousing suspicion but every one of them had claimed that she'd been in perfect physical condition. Kagome had spent those first two weeks distraught and confused.

Salvation had chanced upon her in the form of a smirking eleventh grader by the name of Satsugawa Bankotsu, who had unintentionally stumbled upon her quivering form during one of her agonizing bouts. She'd been crouched in a shadowed corner of the school roof after stumbling out there in fear of waking her roommate. Who knew what the boy had been doing in such a place so late at night, but Kagome was grateful for the haphazard meeting. He'd offered her the same dark drug that she had just consumed after some pointless mumbo jumbo about only letting her have it for free because she'd appealed to him visually. It was impossible for her to remember details in the state she'd been in.

Bankotsu had been insistent that his 'little babies' would cure anything that ailed her. His confidence in the drug's effectiveness had seen her swallowing the dark little sphere without question in a desperate attempt to null the pain. The pill had worked almost instantaneously and had had Kagome running back to Bankotsu on occasion to get more of it.

She'd stopped taking them after her father had found out.

It pained her now to have to defile the man's memory by using them again but she'd been left with no other choice. Kagome had grown tired of always being the one that other people protected. She abhorred the feeling of utter uselessness that it brought her. Always the helpless damsel. Always the one other people fought for. Always the one other people took the hurt for. Kouga had done so and it had landed him in a coma with no certain chance of awakening. The people at the mansion had tried, and it had left their families grieving for the losses. And now, even Kouran, who she'd known for not more than three weeks, had suffered too.

For once, Kagome wanted to be the one doing the protecting. Even if it was from herself. For once, she wanted to prove that she was worthy of the sacrifices that these people had made. She wouldn't, _couldn't _let anyone else be hurt for her sake. It might have been selfish to think so, but she knew that her sanity depended on it. She would never forgive herself if she failed in even this.

When the painful bouts had started up again four days ago, she'd made a solemn pledge not to lose her head over them. Kagome had never been one for sitting idly by while life took its course. She needed her problem remedied and so help her she would put a bullet to her brain before she let another incident like Kouran's happen again. It had taken a lot to suppress the strange forces within her but each time they had threatened to erupt, she'd been more determined to fight them. The way she saw it, if there was a way to suppress that damnable power, then there most certainly would be one to rid it completely from her being.

She walked with Kouran in a companiable silence.

Upon re-entering the cafeteria, Kagome's eyes roamed over the room's occupants, looking for the same dark head she'd been hoping to see for the past four days. She knew it was stupid to do so, she hadn't caught a glimpse of hide nor hair of the mysterious boy from the stairwell for all that time. It was the same now. She continued onward to her seat, where her plate from before remained.

* * *

Inuyasha felt silly. 

The sentiment was justifiable. At the moment, his six foot frame was squeezed under the moderately sized mahogany desk inside Principal Kinou's office. He shifted a little to get into a more comfortable position. Now one should never misunderstand, Inuyasha was no stranger to such a place. Why, he could barely even remember all the times he'd been sent to Kaede's office during the ten years he'd lodged at Sector So54. But the visits had never involved anything remotely similar to _this._

His legs were what bothered him most. Being the height he was certainly did have its advantages, but one could never dismiss the drawbacks either, especially in cramped conditions such as this. Not that the hanyou was claustrophobic or anything, it was just that if he stayed in this position any longer, he was almost certain he'd remain the shape he was currently curled into for… well, _ever_, in which case he'd have to kiss all his aspirations of overtaking his brother in height a sloppy goodbye. Now _that _would be a blooming shame. He only hadtwo and a half inches to go.

He chanced a peek towards the reception area outside the principal's office. Through the glass that separated it from the rest of the guest lounge, Inuyasha could see the old receptionist sorting through some folders from a metal cabinet beside the door. He swore that that filing cabinet must have been strategically placed to keep him from leaving the room. He'd give it a sound kick on the way out.

If he ever got out.

Inuyasha cursed the wrinkled old hag for being so slow. He cursed the desk he was under for being so spatially limited. He cursed his crappy luck for putting him in this situation.

Inuyasha shifted again to ease the aching in his joints.

He cursed his parents… well maybe just his dad, for giving him such tall genes. He cursed Higurashi Kagome for being so damnably intriguing.

The girl's actions that afternoon had piqued his previously deadened interest. The minute she'd been out of his sight, he'd gone on a rampage, browsing through the school's student records and questioning every unfortunate student to have crossed his path. He'd wanted to find out about the boy Higurashi had bought the strange materialoff.

The bastard was the reason Inuyasha had snuck into this damn office in the first place. He'd put a bug in the security camera to hide his activities before running a check on the dark-haired boy he'd seen Higurashi associating with that afternoon. He'd had to make up some phoney excuse before Jaken had agreed to give him the keys to the principal's lounge. It wasn't supposed to be his business what the Higurashi girl did in her spare time but then again, he _was _technically duty-bound to find out who she socialized with. Hell, he didn't want her _dying _from drug overdose on him. He couldn't allow something like _that _to happen, not on his watch. Inuyasha had a bigger sense of self preservation than that.

And so, with that reasoning in mind, Inuyasha had accessed the principal's private files on SNIE's many students. Like himself, Satsugawa Bankotsu was serving his last year at the academy. Inuyasha had laughed when he'd read Mister Kinou's private notes on the boy. _Apparently_ the man suspected him of being a pusher but lacked evidence to prove it.

_'No shit.'_

Inuyasha had thought with a roll of his eyes. Half the damn school already knew that. However, Bankotsu had yet to be caught in the act. His room had been searched thrice before and had turned up clean each time. Inuyasha had just about collected the information he'd required and been ready to leave when the old lady had entered the reception lounge. In the process of killing the lamplight, shutting off the monitor and diving for cover under Mister Kinou's wooden desk, Inuyasha had suffered quite a bruising to his left elbow, which had been unintentionally slammed into the edge of said desk in his frenzy.

Inuyasha cursed Satsugawa Bankotsu for existing. He wasn't _hiding _per se. A tough guy like himself never _hid. _He was merely avoiding being seen.

Inuyasha snapped out of his misery when he found himself plunged suddenly into darkness. Finally! The old lady must have left. It was about time too. Inuyasha pulled himself out from his place under the piece of mahogany furniture and was glad to find that he could straighten himself out without much difficulty. He estimated a total of twenty-two bone clicks before he reached his full height. Another five or so came later when he arched his back. Right, now that he was sure his growth hadn't been stunted, he would continue to his next destination.

The unfortunate filing cabinet outside the principal's door vibrated as Inuyasha's foot connected with its side.

He checked his watch. Only fifteen minutes till dinner ended. He broke into a run. With any luck, Bankotsu might stay out late. It would give him more time.

Inuyasha skidded to a halt outside the door marked 3-168. Satsugawa Bankotsu's room.

Inuyasha recalled the unofficial lesson he'd received from Miroku during one of their preteen escapades in So54. If there was one thing Inuyasha was grateful to the grope-happy monk for, it was the ability he'd gotten off him to pick locks. Sure the one on their sector's kitchen entrance had been poppy-cock compared to the enforced bolts of SNIE's dormitory room doors, but it was all the same basic concept!

But he had to be quick about it and the only way to do so, would be to revert back into his half demon form. Chancing a cautious glance both ways along the corridor, he saw that it was completely people-free. He punched the reversion code into his wristband and changed back into the appearance he was most comfortable with. Using two unwound paper clips he'd obtained (_stolen)_ from Principal Kinou's room, Inuyasha then proceeded to conquer the lock on Bankotsu's door. He'd done it a million times before. This would be so much faster than running all the way to Jaken for a master key.

He inserted one of the makeshift picks into the key hole. It would act as a wrench to turn the lock with. Inuyasha slid the other paper clip in and concentrated hard. Each subtle click of the lock's five inner pins sliding into position inside the keyhole's internal shaft was picked up easily by his sensitive hearing and soon enough, the bolt turned without resistance. Inuyasha rushed in and swung the door shut.

Alright. He now had ten minutes to completely search the bastard's room as well get his butt out of there unnoticed. He set to work immediately. Putting his sensitive nose to the test. He sniffed high and low. In the closet and under the bed. Inside drawers and behind the curtains.

Satsugawa Bankotsu's room, which the boy shared with his younger brother, Ginkotsu, could have been likened to a junkyard. A junkyard that a violently explosive bomb had been dropped onto. Twice.

Inuyasha found pizza scraps, sushi scraps, pencils, pens, textbooks, ten foreign coins, waste paper, a couple of raunchy magazines, one disposable camera casing, a fluffy grey bunny, which he promptly wished he hadn't found, and some other mediocre garbage. But nothing of what he was looking for. After searching under both mattresses without success, Inuyasha started to grow frustrated. He checked his watch again. Dinner had already ended! It would only be a matter of time before Bankotsu and the rest of the school returned to their dormitories. And he hadn't acquired anything!

His eyes caught sight of the boy's navy blue blazer hanging behind the room's bathroom door. He rushed up to it and reached a hopeful hand into its inner pocket. Alas, that too pulled up nothing. Inuyasha resorted to a last, desperate action. He pushed his pride aside and brought his nose to the blazer's pocket. Smelling a fellow male person's clothes would be considered by many people to be degrading. Inuyasha was one of these people.

The fates must have been jumping up and down with glee. What with today being put-Inuyasha-in-embarrassing-situations day and all. He caught the faint whiff of something medicinal amongst a few other scents which he forced himself not to register.

The sound of voices wafted in from outside the room. Inuyasha had to get out. Fast.

He ran to the door and glanced through the peep hole. He nearly growled out loud when the unmistakable ebony braid of Satsugawa Bankotsu met his sight. No, not the door. He turned back and nearly slapped his forehead in exasperation. Of course! The window. He was such a stupid fuck sometimes.

Inuyasha dashed over and swung the glass pane open just as the sound of a key sliding through the lock behind him reached his ears.

* * *

Bankotsu stepped into his room, throwing his sweater onto the bed. The lack of covering on his arms left them vulnerable to the cool evening draft. Bankotsu growled. He'd told Ginkotsu time and time again to always keep the damn windows closed but the idiot never listened to a word he said. He had a good mind to decapitate the boy sometimes. Bankotsu walked over to the offending window and slammed it shut. His hand remained on the metal frame for a few seconds as he took in the sight before him. 

_'Hn. A full moon. Something bad's going to happen to someone tonight.'_

He'd always been a superstitious chap.

He turned away and made for the bathroom. For now, he needed a shower. He'd be seeing Jakotsu tomorrow. That alone put him in a better mood.

* * *

Inuyasha's fingers ached. He didn't know how long he'd been hanging by just one hand from Bankotsu's window ledge. The sound of running water confirmed that it was safe for him to swing his other arm up to help support his weight. He pulled himself just high enough for his golden eyes to peek over the ledge and into the room. Empty. Bankotsu was in the shower. 

The breeze that had been blowing previously had stopped. A strong scent assaulted Inuyasha's senses. It was the same smell medicinal scent he'd gotten from Bankotsu's uniform! And it was coming from the… window sill? Quietly reopening the window, Inuyasha pulled himself into the room once more. He threw a cautious glance in the direction of the bathroom. Bankotsu was still occupied. Inuyasha reached a hand to feel under the window's thick metal frame. After a few seconds, his searching fingers chanced upon a slight crevice in the concrete below the sill.

_'Hello. What's this?'_

He dug deeper.

The small square-shaped packet that he pulled out from the crack in the wall a few seconds later was identical to the one he'd seen Higurashi Kagome purchase earlier that day. Bankotsu sure was a sneaky little bugger. The raids on his room hadn't picked up anything because his stash hadn't _been _in his room.

Finally! Inuyasha's luck was starting to take a turn for the better. He'd found what he'd been looking for. Now that he had a sample of the drug, he might be able find out what Higurashi Kagome would use it for. It was just for kicks mostly. He couldn't help himself if school life was just so _boring. _Hey, who knew, maybe he'd learn something really interesting in the process.

But for now, he needed to get out fast.

Inuyasha shut the window gently and tip toed to the door whose lock he had previously picked. In the short time it took to reach it, he had reverted back to his human form.

His exit was soundless.

Inuyasha was home free! Now all he had to worry about was a brutalization from Sesshoumaru, whom he would be meeting at half past eleven tonight. That was cool. He'd start stressing in three hours.

Inuyasha's stomach demanded a feeding after having been neglected by him in favour of the unauthorised raid of a fellow schoolmate's room. It growled its protest loudly. And so, in apology, the fairly happy, but horrendously hungry hanyou headed down to the cafeteria in search of leftovers.

However, the fates were not to be kind to the half-blood yet again.

Because when the boy pushed open the double doors of SNIE's main cafeteria, he found himself walking into a petite, feminine body.

* * *

Kagome muttered a hasty apology to the chest she'd collided with. 

Due to her impromptu trip to the bathroom, she had not been able to finish her dinner at the same time as everyone else. She'd made apologetic smiles to the cleaning guy before going on her way.

She'd planned on getting back to her room and perhaps finishing off some homework before the weekend. Getting a face full of man-chest had not been in her agenda for the night. The cleaner yelled out from behind her.

"Hey Nishijima! Don't you be bothering the little missy now!"

Kagome had ducked her head in embarrassment and been prepared to move past the person she'd banged into when the sound of his retort stopped her short.

"Shut it Myouga."

That voice!

Her head snapped up so fast she'd nearly had a whiplash. The top of it collided none-too-gently with the bottom of the boy's jaw.

"Fuck!"

Inuyasha brought both hands to his abused mouth. The bitch had made him bite his own tongue! The action had been done in reflex. The searing pain that had erupted made him forget that his hands had originally been occupied with holding the cafeteria doors open.

The twin metal flaps, now having nothing to keep them in place, swung back onto the pair, colliding soundly with Higurashi Kagome's back.

"Miss Kagome!"

Kouran's worried shout registered somewhere in the back of Kagome's mind, as she was sent careening into the boy's chest once again.

Now, human beings, under normal circumstances, use their hands to obtain balance in situations of instability. They flail, they grab and they steady themselves. It is an instinctive trait.

However, Kagome's hands had, at the time of the unfortunate mishap, been cradling the top of her head, which she _knew _would develop a lump come tomorrow morning. Inuyasha'd had _his _hands over his slightly bleeding mouth.

Due to these circumstantial handicaps the two were sent sprawling to the floor in a rather laughable show of inelegance.

"I-I'm sorry! Are you okay?"

Kagome's face was burning. She'd never felt so stupid in her life! The boy wasn't moving. His eyes were closed.

_'Oh my god! I've killed him!'_

Inuyasha recognised the girl's voice instantly. For a few moments he kept his eyes shut, hoping beyond hope that he was somehow mistaken. The girl shifted. Her breaths quickened. What was she doing? He cracked one eyelid open.

"Hey! Um… Nishijima-san? Please wake up!"

The girl was bent over his body. Hands pressed onto the ground on both sides of his head. Oh god. She wasn't going to try a mouth-to-mouth on him was she? You only did that to suffocating people. He had to stop this quick.

Kagome nearly collapsed with relief when she heard the boy's gruff voice.

"This is indecent. Get off me."

His eyes were now open. And they were glaring.

It took Kagome's mind some time to fully process what he had meant. Kouran coughed somewhere behind her. This drew her attention to the position she was currently in. She took in the location of her hands with respect to the boy's head, the proximity of her face to his, the situation of her knees on either side of his waist and yelped. Kagome scrambled off.

"Ah! Sorry!"

The boy sat up and flexed his jaw. He brought his fingers to his lips. They came away bloody.

_'Fucking hell.'_

Tonight had to have been the worse night in his life. With less than three hours to go before he met his brother, Higurashi Kagome was the last person he'd have wanted to run into.

A small, white slip of cloth hovered in front of his face. Inuyasha glanced up. The Higurashi girl was standing over him holding her handkerchief.

"Here. Um…You can use this."

She smiled sheepishly and gestured toward his bleeding mouth. She had a cute smile. Not that he was looking or anything. He got to his feet and brushed himself off.

"Keh. Keep it."

He scoffed and turned on his heel, ready to leave. His would be dramatic exit was ruined when the sound of his growling stomach cut through the silent night air. He turned round just in time to prevent a flying sandwich from impacting his face. Myouga's curse came from somewhere behind Kouran.

"Damn it! Almost had you!"

Inuyasha didn't know how long the old man and bodyguard had been standing there. He cast them a suspicious glance. Myouga smirked.

"I knew you'd come begging for some chow sooner or later like some hungry mutt. So I saved you that from before. Wouldn't want you raiding our fridge like you did last time."

Inuyasha's reply sounded forced.

"This is sympathy food."

Myouga sent him a sly look.

"Hey now, beggars can't be choosers. You didn't seem quite so grouchy a few minutes ago. Did we interrupt something good?"

Inuyasha growled but refrained from pommeling the flea-like man. He needed the old geezer alive and well to feed him in the future.

Kagome was left with a weird feeling of déjà vu as the boy turned and stalked away. She found herself, once again facing retreating his back. And once again, she found that she couldn't help the smile that graced her face.

* * *


	10. Family Reunion

_**Puppet Without Strings**_

* * *

**Chapter 9**

"…_And in further news, the World Medical Trust has cut back on research funding to Inari General Hospital's head of child psychology, Doctor Kuronaga Suikotsu. The decision came after the doctor allegedly lost his head and assaulted the father of one of his young charges, though the reasons for this highly uncharacteristic act of violence remains to be seen. We go now to Fuumie Kagura for more on this story-"_

Sesshoumaru hit the mute button on his remote.

He'd yet to finish his report. Which was ironic considering the absolute _lack _of information he'd acquired to put into it. Funny, how report writing got that much more difficult when one had less to report about. It was disgraceful, really. It wouldn't be wrong to go so far as to say that the dog demon lord-to-be, was starting to feel the first inklings of… stress.

Sesshoumaru had never taken well to stress. He never showed it outwardly, but it acted on the violent side of his nature.

Back in his pre-leadership days, Inuyasha had usually taken the brunt of this uncharacteristic aggressiveness. Sesshoumaru had passed it off as combat training for the twerp. It had worked two ways. On one hand, he'd be working off his aggravations, and on the other, he'd be toughening his little brother up. It was he who'd been responsible for most of Inuyasha's fighting instruction during the boy's early years.

After all, at that period of time, existence as a half-blood was no laughing matter. It was a shock the runt had survived the four months he'd been left at the orphanage unprotected. Sesshoumaru remembered being appalled at how weak the half-demon had been when he'd first taken him in. Granted, the boy had had an attitude problem the size of Sengoku and a rather irritating habit of biting anyone that came within a two metre radius of him.

Sesshoumaru snapped himself out of his reminiscence. With a disgruntled sigh of frustration, his fingers tapped in a final five words before lifting the laptop off his knees and onto the coffee table before him. The dog demon's lean upper body bent forward slightly to allow his elbows to rest on his lap. Clawed fingers intertwined, lacing their owner's two hands together to provide a platform of support for his strong chin to rest upon.

Sesshoumaru shut his eyes and exhaled before reopening them slowly. From beneath almost-effeminate lashes, his molten pupils found themselves momentarily fixated upon the flat-screened television that hung from the opposite wall. The red-tinged gaze that met his from behind the glowing screen was bordered by heavily made up skin.

But despite this, Sesshoumaru could almost see the potent anger that the woman emanated. It was subtle, but it showed through her eyes. The redness of them accentuated it.

Sesshoumaru briefly wondered if his tamperings with her report had been anything to do with this negative emotion.

The display was soundless. Fuumie Kagura's lips moved robotically as she delivered her story in front of the aforementioned hospital.

He hadn't really meant to take such meticulous note of the fiery reporter on channel four's news broadcast. But acute observation had always been a habit of his. It was part of his nature to pinpoint subtle detail even in the most mediocre of situations. And despite his distracted frame of mind, Sesshoumaru could see that Fuumie Kagura was tired. Exhausted even. It was written all over her face. It was in her sluggish body language. The rapid blinking of her eyes.

As the woman ended her report, she gave an awkward smile. One that looked forced and unnatural. And when the screen cut back to the news room, Sesshoumaru dropped his gaze from it. Brief interest wiped clean from his mind.

The sleek, silvery device that he'd been typing on before sat, unmoved in front of him. Sesshoumaru reread the document he'd previously been working on. The words seemed to taunt him. They mocked his inability to give reason to the many unanswered questions his case presented. Yet Sesshoumaru could not find a way to prove them wrong.

Soft beeping from his wall clock signalled that it was about time he got ready. The dog demon rose gracefully from his living room couch and made the journey across the ivory carpet to his bathroom in long, brisk strides.

He needed a shower.

* * *

Several kilometres north east of the dog demon, Inuyasha wondered if it was too late to contact his perverted friend Miroku. Knowing the monk, he was probably up to his usual Friday night mischief. Regardless of the fact that his partner in crime was currently hundreds of miles away, prepping himself mentally for dire challenges ahead. 

If Inuyasha was ever going to find out what the strange drug he'd nicked from Bankotsu's room was made of, he'd need the unholy monk's help. Miroku was a specialist on anything magical. This included talismans, artefacts and many medicinal items. After all, his role as a monk demanded certain skills.

The hanyou checked his watch for the third time that hour.

Half past ten. Time to face the music.

* * *

The warm water that pattered his back could have been therapeutic. As it ran in meandering rivulets down his skin, Sesshoumaru felt some of the tension leak slowly out his body. But as always, this momentary comfort worked two ways. With the lessened distraction from his bothered nerves, Sesshoumaru's mind found itself running into overdrive. 

The puzzles seemed to keep on stacking. Currently, the one question that burned at the surface pertained to the wolf demon, Kouga.

Upon arriving from Genrai that afternoon, Sesshoumaru had made a stop at Government Headquarters to visit his unconscious former comrade. By all accounts, Kouga should have been completely healed. He should have been in perfect physical shape even, despite the obvious lack of consciousness.

That had not been the case.

To Sesshoumaru's complete bewilderment, the wolf had looked no better than when he'd seen him nearly four weeks ago.

The gashes on Kouga's body had yet to start closing up. It made absolutely no sense. Even a human person would have recovered at least partially given the same amount of time. The worst thing was that the bleeding never seemed to completely stop. Had Kouga not been in government care, he would have met his death slowly from the blood loss. A long and drawn out end. As of now, he relied totally upon transfusions to remain alive.

The doctors had at first speculated the cause to be an induced bleeding disease. They'd tried stemming the blood-flow with everything from stitching to clotting without so much as a hair's worth of success.

Sesshoumaru frowned. Silky tendrils of his platinum hair fell past pale shoulders as the dog demon bent his head in a habitual posture of contemplation. Twin palms braced themselves upon the wall under the shower head as he allowed the water that spilled from it to soak into his silvery mane.

Kouga's condition was another problem to be added to his growing pile. He needed answers and he needed them now. Capturing the presidents' killer would be the first step. He had yet to discover the motive to the killing. Perhaps, along the way he'd even find a cure for Kouga.

If it continued this way. Sesshoumaru knew the higher ups would be forced to put his former team mate down. After all, what good was a demon to them comatose.

Sesshoumaru's right hand slid down from its position against the wall and twisted the shower handle shut. He stepped out and towelled himself off.

Had the killer been using some sort of purifying weapon? One that was preventing Kouga's demonesque body from healing itself? It didn't add up in Sesshoumaru's mind. Purifying weapons were meant to eliminate youkai as quickly and efficiently as possible. A demon-blooded person subjected to the effects of a purifying agent upon death would have disintegrated. Literally.

The corpses of the two dead youkai bodyguards, however, had been whole.

The bullets retrieved from each and every one of the bodies had been just that. Bullets. Nothing fancy. No modifications. No traces of purifying energy. Perhaps the killer or his contractor had found some non-conventional way of exterminating youkai? If so, Sesshoumaru shuddered to think what they might be up against.

Soft beeping from his mobile phone echoed through the hall and the dog demon pushed aside his musings for the time being. It was time for him to leave.

He got dressed and exited the apartment.

* * *

Inuyasha glanced down at his ensemble. Dark jeans, dark shoes, dark hair pulled back by an equally dark elastic band and stuffed down a dark hooded sweater that hid a dark button down shirt. And to top it all off, he grasped a dark cap to hide his hanyou ears with. For later use. He would be needing it when he transformed outside school grounds. Inuyasha glanced at himself in the mirror and growled. 

_'Ilook like some sort of hobo.'_

The day was shaping up like no other before. Inuyasha counted off mental fingers. First, he'd found out a rather shocking secret about Higurashi Kagome. Then there'd been the incident in principal Kinou's office that had threatened to stunt him for life. And after _that_, had come the little snoop-job in Satsugawa Bankotsu's room. Where events that he'd rather wipe from his memory had taken place. And finally, not two hours ago, he'd landed himself in a compromising position on the cafeteria floors with none other thanthe president's daughterherself.

Inuaysha concluded that he had absolutely no good luck at all.

The human recovery rate was frustratingly slow. That semi-self-inflicted bite to his tongue, from when the girl's head had had a rather violent collision with his jaw was still not healed. It stung when he touched the wound to any other part of his mouth.

Inuyasha had to wonder if there was some sort of de facto limit to the number of embarrassing situations one could go through before a breaking point was reached. When he stepped out into the hallway, his instincts demanded that he dive right back into his dormitory for a last minute change of attire. And he would have, too. Had it not already been so darn late. He needed to leave.

The corridor lights had been dimmed, which might or might not have been a good thing. It made his shadowy figure blend in soundly with its surroundings. Inuyasha rolled his eyes. Why in the seven hells had Jaken told him to dress like this? The toad was so paranoid it was funny. It wasn't like he was doing anything illegal. Sure his intended destination was a technically 'out-of-bounds' area to the institute and all its students but the school board sure as hell didn't know that. If anyone checked, he was simply leaving academy grounds to visit family.

Inuyasha had even prepared a well-spun little tale for the security guards at the front gate. He'd gone for a rather heart-wrenching number. A loving younger brother rushing off to see his critically cancerous older sibling in his finals days on Earth. It would tug at the very strings inside each and every one of their hearts. He would not get into trouble. The school board would certainly sympathise with his story. It wasn't _totally _fabricated. What would Sesshoumaru be if not family?

The half demon descended the stairs and stalked into the lounge area of his dormitory block where Jaken stood waiting.

"What took you so long?"

The toad's angry question grated on Inuyasha's nerves. It wasn't like he was late or anything. His fist twitched with the effort it took to refrain from hitting the older demon. No. He could do that later when he wasn't on a time restraint. Instead he bit out a reply.

"Had to pick out something decent to wear."

Inuyasha gestured to his clothing with a heated glare at Jaken. The toad growled. He simply could not understand the hanyou's stubbornness. It made perfect sense! If you didn't want to be recognised, you wore inconspicuous clothing! It was simple as that!

He stalked up to Inuyasha and jabbed his ugly two-headed walking stick intothe boy'schest.

"Stop complaining you twit. You face expulsion if someone recognises you on that side of town. This is just to make sure you don't get caught."

"Caught! Caught by who? The _fashion police_?"

Jaken narrowed his eyes.

"Cut the crap, hanyou. Lord knows you've already gotten yourself into bad enough situations. Don't think I didn't find out about your little romp in the cafeteria earlier."

Inuyasha rolled his eyes. It wasn't so much that he was adverse to the clothing he wore. It was just that, where Jaken was concerned, being difficult had always been a _must_ for him.

"So what? You going to tell on me again? Why don't you get your facts straight? The bitch _fell_ on _me_. It's not like I instigated anything."

Jaken's threw the half-blood a calculative look.

"Yes. I'm sure."

He said it in a totally unbelieving way.

"Ass."

The mumbled remark saw Jaken rounding on him again.

"You immature hanyou brat! Your father and brother would not have complained. Get it through your thick skull that we are simply erring on the side of caution."

Eye-rolling had become Inuyasha's specialty for the evening.

"Well you can e_rr_ the fuck away from it, then. I'm not going to get caught."

Once again the half-blood had to wonder why Jaken could take so well to his brother who he, by all accounts, bore a spitting resemblance to. The toad could not so much as hold a decent conversation with him without breaking into some sort of squabble.

Not that Inuyasha had any intention of making things better, mind you.

Ever since the day they'd first met, Jaken had held a burning grudge toward the half-blood. Despite his premature mindset, Inuyasha had known the feeling ran deeper than mere irritation sparked bya six-year-old 's casual dubbing of 'Wrinkled Old Fart' to Jaken's then… less-wrinkled self. Looking back on it now, Inuyasha cringed at his limited choice in vocabulary. But what was a pre-schooler to do when he hadn't yet been exposed to the wonders of profanity. From the very beginning, the toad hadn't liked him. Had despised him even. Inuyasha hadn't understood such unprovoked hostility at his young age and like any other confused pup, had retaliated aggressively to the toad's ill-will.

It had taken life at So54 and another several years before the hanyou finally came to understand Jaken's animosity toward him. He'd also come to realise that the toad demon had not been the only one to blame him for the death of his parents…

"I'm done with your childishness. Let's get going before I bust a nerve over this. The sooner you're out of my sight, the better."

Jaken's hoarse voice cut through his train of thought. Inuyasha waved him off and sauntered in the direction of the car park.

"Likewise Croaky."

Silence permeated the trip to Jaken's awaiting car during which Inuyasha intermittently fought down the urge to trip the little bugger up. The half demon cringed at the thought of having to sit through an entire half-hour car ride with no one but Wrinkle-Head for company.

Inuyasha's chance to feed his bogus story to the security people never came. They let them through without a second glance when Jaken handed them some false medical documents and letters. Thirty minutes should not have been a very long time to wait. But to Inuyasha, it felt like an eternity. During the first ten minutes, he succeeded in thouroughly pissing Jaken off on a whole new level. After shrugging off his sweater, he'd fidgeted, played around with the car seat, rummaged through the glove compartment, pressed down on the cigarette lighter no less than five times and toggled at the air-conditioning control.

Jaken's response was to grit his teeth and step down harder on the accelerator. His only consolation being the fact that Inuyasha would suffer by Sesshoumaru's hand.

When deafening black metal suddenly blasted from the car's four speakers after the boy flipped his radio on, the little toad lost it. He floored the accelerator.

They arrived at their destination five minutes later.

'Shijun'. The six letters flashed bright over metal doors that lead into the afamed nightclub. The line of waiting patrons extended nearly up to the road.

Pride was the only thing that stopped Inuyasha from scrambling out of the vehicle the minute it pulled to screeching halt. This confirmed his theories about Jaken with wheels. The man was a maniac! There had been times in the last five minutes when Inuyasha could have sworn that bits of his life had flashed before his eyes.

The good thing was that it had made him half an hour early.

A sudden thought struck Inuyasha. Jaken hadn't been instructed to accompany him. Which meant that he'd be tattle-tale free for the time being! This was great! With no one breathing down his neck at every action he made, Inuyasha would be able to contact Miroku about Satsugawa Bankotsu's pill. He hadn't done so before because he knew Jaken would have found out. The little git had ways of fishing for information that Inuyasha knew could not be taken lightly. After all, this was merely his own curiosity at work. It was in no way part of his assignment.

The hanyou pretended to wait in line. The crowd was pretty thick. As Inuyasha got engulfed by it, he snuck his hand into the coat pocket of the man beside him. When one could pick a high-grade lock in thirty seconds flat, one could most definitely pick a pocket with ease. The man never even noticed his designer phone being lifted out of his jacket and into the pocket of the boy beside him. Inuyasha smirked.

He'd give it back when he was finished with it.

The hanyou knew that using his own mobile phone was out of the question. Somehow he had a sneaking suspicion that Jaken monitored his line.

When Inuyasha was sure that the toad demon's car was far enough away, he darted out of the crowd and whipped out his new accessory.

With the number to Houshi Miroku's cell punched in, the half demon propped the phone against his shoulder and ducked into the alley behind between two large brick buildings. Now that his hands were free, he was able to revert back into his hanyou form. Inuyasha counted four rings before the call was answered.

The voice on the other end had been overly deepened.

"Hello there. How may this humble monk serve you tonight?"

For the umpteenth time that day, Inuyasha rolled his eyes.

"You could take the cheesiness down a notch for starters."

For a few seconds, there was nothing on the other end. Then, what sounded like an exasperated sigh finally broke the silence.

"Inuyasha?"

"Took you long enough, idiot."

Miroku's voice sounded dejected this time.

"You're not Michelle."

"Hm, let me think. Nope."

"Damn! I had a whole new pick-up line and everything."

Inuyasha checked himself. No. No more eye rolling. Some things never changed.

"Whatever. I need you to help me out with something."

Miroku's reply sounded weary.

"I don't know. The last time you said that I ended up locked in a broom closet for a night. That wasn't very comfortable."

"_That _was different, you ass."

"Uh-huh."

Inuyasha continued like he hadn't said anything.

"Listen I need you to help me identify this drug I got off some kid here."

The caution in Miroku's voice increased.

"What you're asking... It wouldn't happen to be illegal would it?"

"Yeah. So?"

"So you could get me in trouble. Again."

Inuyasha shrugged his comment off.

"I guess. So what do you say?"

"No."

The line went dead.

Inuyasha sighed. This was going to be a long night.

Meanwhile, Sesshoumaru had emerged from his vehicle just in time to catch a glimpse of a familiar head of black hair dart into the alley some distance away. He raised an eyebrow ever so slightly as his legs carried him silently to the area in question. As he drew closer, the scent of his brother was undeniable. Sesshoumaru's curiosity heightened. What on earth was the boy up to?

Inuyasha, for his part, was wondering if sending an illegal substance through the mail would be classified as smuggling.

After thinking it through. He decided against that. It'd be too risky. He'd just have to convince Miroku to come over to Sengoku City in the weekend. He could pass him Bankotsu's strange pill then.

"Come on, monk! Just treat it like a damn vacation. You come get the stuff from me, and then you're free to frolic in the city."

Miroku had hung up on him three times already.

"Inuyasha, I'm expecting a call from a potential hot date. Please stop hogging the line."

Inuyasha growled.

"Damn it Miroku, this is important! I need to find out why that girl would take something like this!"

It was Miroku's turn to roll his eyes.

"The same reason anyone else would use drugs, Inuyasha! To get high. To get away."

Inuyasha growled.

"No. You got it all wrong, monk. She's not the type of person to get off on something like that. I mean from what I've seen, Higurashi Kagome is as close to a righteous prude as you could get-"

He could almost hear Miroku perking up.

"Higurashi Kagome? _The _Higurashi Kagome?"

"Do you _know _anyone else with a name like that!"

Miroku's voice grew excited.

"So you're saying your current _top-secret _assignment, whatever it may be, involves you being around _Higurashi Kagome_?"

What the heck, Inuyasha was desperate.

"Yeah, kind of."

Miroku's wooped in delight.

"You lucky _bastard_! That girl ranks in at number eight on Houshi Miroku's Top Ten Dream Dates of all time!"

"What the fuck?"

Inuyasha heard shuffling in the background. The monk must have just sat up in bed. When Miroku spoke again, his voice sounded wistful.

"I remember when she appeared on television last year. Man, I couldn't take my eyes off the girl!"

Inuyasha narrowed _his _eyes in suspicion.

"Exactly which part of 'the girl' could you not take your perving eyes off?"

Miroku didn't even have the dignity to feign innocence.

"Hey, I'm only human. You can't deny Miss Higurashi looks great from behind."

Inuyasha's found his head nodding unconsciously. He caught himself and shook the traitorous appendage in annoyance. This didn't stop the blood that had started rising in his cheeks. His brow twitched.

"Can we get back on topic here? Fucking pervert."

Miroku feigned hurt.

"I'd prefer to think that I appreciate the beauty around me. Unlike some people."

Inuyasha shut his eyes in irritation. He leaned back against the wall.

"Whatever. So you in or not?"

"I'll be there at three tomorrow afternoon."

Inuyasha almost yipped in triumph.

"Knew you'd come to your senses. Meet me at Matsumi Square."

"Right. Right."

Inuyasha heard a click on the other end. He put the phone away and popped his black cap onto his head and exited the alley.

It was then that the hanyou picked up the familiar scent that he'd dreaded for days. Inuyasha heard more than saw Sesshoumaru's approach. His older brother's measured footsteps echoed in the night. They stopped a few metres in front of him. Inuyasha glanced at the cell phone's clock.

It was still early.

Obviously, the half-blood hadn't been the only one who'd arrived before the set time. Inuyasha smirked slightly. He should have known. Sesshoumaru had never been one for tardiness.

"Dare I ask what you were doing in there?"

Inuyasha cringed inwardly. He wondered how much his brother had heard. With his luck and Sesshoumaru's acute hearing, he'd probably heard quite a bit.

The taller demon's face was impassive as ever. To a silent observer, Sesshoumaru's expression might have been mistaken for nonchalance. As if the man were not really interested in his answer. Inuyasha knew better. Still water always ran deep with his older brother. That was what made him so effective a leader. He showed nothing outwardly. He could have been furious. And he could have been amused. One could never tell with Sesshoumaru.

Inuyasha sighed. He should have known how impossible it would have been to keep things from his brother. He might as well get this over with.

"Higurashi Kagome has been taking this."

He reached into his pocket and pulled out the pill in question. Sesshoumaru took the object from Inuyasha's grasp and examined it. Never being one for unnecessary use of speech, the taller dog demon stayed silent and waited for his half-blooded brother to continue. Inuyasha started his next sentence slowly.

"I have my suspicions about what it does."

Sesshoumaru's reply sounded bored. If his brother intended to leave this place unscathed, he'd better make his explanation good.

"Enlighten me."

Inuyasha inhaled and started.

"Four days ago, the girl let off a reasonably powerful blast of purifying energy-"

It was feint, but Inuyasha could see the slight interest kindling in his brother's eyes. Sesshoumaru might have been surprised. This egged him on.

"It incapacitated her bodyguard. You should have seen it. The woman was _charred_!"

Sesshoumaru cut in.

"And so, being Inuyasha you decided to play the hero. Hn. Typical."

The half blood glared.

"What the hell did you expect me to do? Leave Kouran there to _rot?_ There was no one else around."

Sesshoumaru quirked an eyebrow at this.

"So you simply defied your orders and made contact with the girl."

Sesshoumaru had meant it more as a statement than an admonishment. But Inuyasha took offense anyway.

_'Hn. Made contact…'_

His brother made Higurashi Kagome sound like some sort of extra terrestrial being. Inuyasha's voice increased in volume.

"Oh excuse _me_ for not running off to _hide_ whenever I come across a smoking heap of flesh."

Inuyasha scoffed loudly and pocketed the drug his brother handed back to him. Sesshoumaru spoke next.

"I've heard only bits and pieces of this story. Kouran can't remember much at all."

The dog demon dropped his amber gaze to his raised right hand, where a strong thumb fingered the talons at the tips of his fingers. His next words were delivered in a deceptively calm voice.

"I find it peculiar that _you _seem to know so much more than Jaken does. I don't suppose you could tell me _why_."

Sesshoumaru turned condescending golden eyes on Inuyasha, who forced himself not to take notice of the razor-sharpness of his brother's claws. Instead, the hanyou clenched his fists and met the older demon's glare with defiance. Sesshoumaru's voice grew a tad colder.

"Your immaturity appals me. Knowing the importance of this assignment I would have expected you to push aside your resentment towards Jaken in favour of your duties. Apparently even that was too much to ask. Why didn't you report your findings to him?"

Inuyasha scoffed. No one nagged like Sesshoumaru could.

"Keh! You think I'd give the old man the satisfaction? You know him, he'd march right up to Higurashi Kagome and question her straight out-"

"And why would that be a bad thing?"

Inuyasha frowned and turned his eyes to the floor once more. He crossed his arms as his gaze became distant.

"Because that wouldn't have done _shit _except for making the girl more scared than she already was. She can't control her powers, Sesshoumaru. I don't even think she really _knew _what she'd done."

At this, Sesshoumaru blinked. How could a person with as high a profile as the president's daughter, not have known of her own powers? The slight surprise on his face only lasted a moment.

"So you think that pill has something to do with her abilities?"

Inuyasha shrugged.

"It's just a hunch-"

His voice grew distant.

"But you should have seen her after she injured Kouran…."

The hanyou frowned.

"The girl was terrified."

Inuyasha went on to recount to his brother what he'd heard that afternoon when he'd seen Kagome buying the mystery drug off Bankotsu. He recalled her nervous comment to the boy.

_"I never thought I'd come back but well… its been acting up again."_

As Sesshoumaru listened, his mind pieced the information together. The dog demon caught on fast.

"So you think that she was referring to her powers. And the drug is her way of coping with them?"

Inuyasha looked up and nodded again. The taller demon now looked mildly interested. He glanced around.

"We'll continue this inside. It's quiet here. Anyone could be listening."

Inuyasha complied and the brothers made their way towards _Shijun_. Inuyasha found himself thoroughly surprised when the bouncer at the doors immediately stepped aside at the sight of Sesshoumaru. Perhaps his brother held more influence than he let on.

On their way through the entrance, Inuyasha seized the chance to slip his borrowed phone back into its rightful owner's pocket. No one but Sesshoumaru noticed the action. The older demon merely quirked a brow.

They were seated at a secluded spot in the back of the nightclub. Blasting music in the background made conversation hard. But the Taisho brothers would cope. The noise lessened the chance of eavesdropping. Sesshoumaru gestured for his brother to continue.

"So anyways, I know it sounds stupid that someone with powers like hers wasn't identified early on. But its true. It seems no one's taught her how to use them. From what I felt, the energy was strong but extremely unfocused."

Sesshoumaru had his arms crossed now.

"What caused this outburst?"

Inuyasha shrugged.

"Damned if I know."

His brother pondered the information for a while. Systematically running over fact after fact in his mind. Suddenly, an idea struck and Sesshoumaru leaned forward quickly.

"Inuyasha. Four years ago, you lost control of your body and turned into a fully demonised version of yourself-"

Inuyasha cringed. Though he couldn't remember the exact details, he did know that that had been the only time he had ever felt such utter helplessness. His body had done things against his will. He'd been… rather frightened.

Sesshoumaru continued.

"-Somehow, the demon energy that had previously been dormant within you had been released. Do you remember why?"

Inuyasha was starting to see where his brother was going with this. The memory was blurry. But he answered anyway.

"Some bastard was holding these three kids hostage. He nearly killed one of them and I got really angry. I think… that was when I started to feel sort of strange. The fucker started insulting my mother and I snapped. After that is a big blur. Do you think that Higurashi-"

"I think your situations are similar, yes. Your dormant energy was unleashed when you lost control of your emotions. The reaction was purely out of animal instinct. Higurashi Kagome, having just experienced the loss of a loved one, lost control of herself. Hn. You've managed to pull up something useful for once."

Inuyasha quirked up and smirked in triumph.

"Ha! So my making 'contact' with the wench wasn't in vain! I'm so going to rub that in Jaken's face. The fucker's been on my back about it the past four days."

Sesshoumaru exhaled. The immaturity was lost on him as he chose to ignore his brother's comment. Involving himself in Jaken and Inuyasha's childish antics was not a priority of his.

But the dog demon couldn't help but feel his mood lighten. With this new found revelation. A new piece of the puzzle had just fallen into place. At last he was getting somewhere! He said the next sentence more to himself.

"I think I might have found one of the answers I've been waiting for."

Of course, with his brother only half a metre away, it was bound to have been heard. Inuyasha paused in his scheming to face Sesshoumaru in curiosity.

"What you talking about?"

Sesshoumaru's explanation came in slowed sentences, as if the man was thinking things out as he went.

"When the assassin attacked President Higurashi, all but one of the guards survived. Kouga. That was because he was the only one that had been able to land a hit on the killer. So what had Kouga had that all the other guards had not?"

Inuyasha had no idea where his brother was going with this.

Kouga?

Kouga had a bigger ego than the entire population of Sengoku put together that's what he had. Not realising the hypocritical nature of his train of thought, Inuyasha frowned. Rather than chance a guess and prove himself a complete nincompoop to his older brother. He chose to stay silent and listen as Sesshoumaru continued.

"Or more precisely, _who _had Kouga had that every other person in that mansion had not."

Inuyasha looked stumped for a while. Then, the answer struck him with such abruptness that his eyes widened. His answer came in an almost-whisper.

"Higurashi Kagome."

Sesshoumaru was so close to smirking, it was alarming. He pulled a tighter reign on his facial expression and schooled his features. The dog demon gave a slight nod.

He needn't have said more. It was clear that Inuyasha understood.

Higurashi Kagome had known that the assassin could have killed her and her brother with ease. Needless to say, she had beenvery scared. That extreme emotion and instinctive need to protect her younger sibling would have made quite the effective trigger to force her powers to manifest themselves…

Inuyasha gaped. That was why the stinky wolf had been able to injure the killer.

It had been Kagome's body's natural way of protecting itself from danger. The energy had hit the assassin as Kouga had attacked and…

Sesshoumaru shut his eyes again and relaxed into the soft cushion of his seat. Weeks of having nothing but puzzles heaped onto him. It all seemed to melt away. For the first time, Sesshoumaru felt like he was getting somewhere. He couldn't help himself. The first inklings of a small smirk appeared at the corner of his lips. He made his final conclusion.

"Precisely. It's possible that the assassin's suit is affected by Higurashi Kagome's purifying energy."

* * *


	11. Questionable Sexuality

_**Puppet Without Strings**_

**

* * *

**

**Chapter 10**

_Beep._

"Mn. Purrti wmuhn… bear …m'child…"

_Beep._

Miroku snuggled deeper into the soft mattress of his one-man bunk. Lips still slightly quirked from whatever skirt chasing dream he might have been having before the most unwelcome interruption.

_Beep. Beep._

"Five 'ore mnnnits…"

_Beep Beep._

The unholy monk cracked open a reluctant eyelid.

_Beep. _

_Beep. Beep._

It was pitch black. He might as well have left his eye closed. He couldn't see anything either way. Who on earth would be calling his personal phone at…

Miroku glanced toward his bedside. It took him a minute and several rapid blinks to register the numbers on the clock face.

_Beep. Beep._

Half past four in the morning? He'd only been asleep for an hour.

_Beep._

The monk groaned and dropped his head back onto the pillow, deciding to ignore the sound. If he paid it no heed, it would eventually go away. It was the oldest trick in any book, both sacred and not.

_Beep. Bee-_

Sure enough, the noise stopped and for a while, and Miroku actually believed he'd be able to get a little more rest. The monk fluffed his military standard white pillow up and prepared himself for more shut eye. His conscious mind started to drift away once again.

_Beep._

The caller was persistent.

_Beep._

But so was he. It was a battle of wills. Miroku flipped over and buried his head under the soft cushion.

_Beep. Beep._

This continued for several minutes. To the sleepy magic-handler, it seemed like hours. Try as he might, the monk could not will his body into slumber. The beeping had uncentered his relaxed aura. The silence of his room amplified the unwelcome sound. It grated on his tired nerves.

_Beep. Beep._

Without moving from his position, the severely irritated magic-handler extended his left hand. It felt its way around the small bedside table, looking for the source of its owner's unrest. Miroku found the offending object with much difficulty. It continued its salvo of beeps and vibrations as the young monk brought the device near his face for the benefit of his ill-adjusted eyes.

The eight digits that appeared on its little screen registered on neither his nor his phone's memory banks. Odd. Miroku's tired mind abhorred being put to work but it ran through possible reasons anyway. So the caller was horribly persistent, was ringing him at a most inconvenient time and, by the looks of it, was using an unknown phone from out of town. Realization dawned and Miroku hit the answer button. There was only one possibility!

"Michiru-san! You finally called! I've been waiting all night!"

Despite his obvious tiredness, the monk could not contain his excitement. The voice that replied sounded annoyed.

"I thought the name was Michelle."

"That's right! I meant Mich-"

Wait a second.

Miroku frowned. The caller didn't sound like the sweet angel he'd met in town yesterday.

"Michelle-san. Are you feeling alright? You sound funny."

"Oh give it up, monk! The wench is never going to call some fucked up pervert who can't even remember her name."

The monk snapped out of his sleepy haze. That was _no _Michelle. Miroku ran a hand down his face and groaned. He'd been so hopeful.

_- Kami-sama, why? -_

The voice had sounded entirely too male. It had sounded entirely too…

"_Inuyasha. _Stop calling this number."

A loud snort came from the other end.

"What you getting all snippy at me for? You _gave_ me the damn number."

"A decision which I sorely regret as of tonight."

Miroku squeezed his eyes shut. It was _far _too early for him to be dealing with _this_! He could practically hearthe grin in the half-blood's voice.

"Heh. Tough. Because I'm going to be bugging you a lot more from now on."

Miroku wished he could be there to wipe the smug expression from the boy's face.

"You sound like some sort of evil stalker person."

"Really? Cool."

"That's it, I'm changing my number."

"Keh. No you aren't."

Inuyasha sounded so sure.

"_Why _are you talking to me? I already said I was going to meet you tomorr- _today._ Why must you persist in annoying the crap out of me?"

There was no immediate answer. Miroku could hear another voice in the background. One that Inuyasha seemed to be conversing with. The hanyou's reply was distracted.

"You say something?"

Miroku rolled his eyes. It was just like Inuyasha to have the attention span of a nit.

"Why are you calling me at this god-awful hour?"

"Oh right. There's been a change of plans, monk."

The half-blood's voice was distant. As if he'd pulled the phone away from his face. Some shuffling was heard before a new voice, the same one he'd heard in the background before, replaced Inuyasha's.

"Houshi."

It was deep. Authoritative. And it sounded most familiar. Miroku cringed.

"Taisho."

Unlike his half-brother, Sesshoumaru had never really quite fit into the 'approachable' category in Miroku's book of acquaintances. _Respectable_. Yes. _Formidable_. Yes. Aside from that, the white-haired demon had managed to accomplish what no other before him had. Ever. Sesshoumaru made Miroku uncomfortable. This constituted to the monk keeping his dealings with the youkai leader to a minimum. They knew of each other's existence merely through their mutual relation with the man's hanyou brother. To be talking to him now meant only one thing.

'_Damn it Inuyasha. What have you gotten me into this time?'_

Sesshoumaru was all business.

"I take it you were going to go through with Inuyasha's little plan?"

Miroku felt the burning need to defend himself.

"Just so you know, sir. It was _all _his idea. I merely agreed to help out a friend."

Somewhere in the back ground, the monk could have sworn he heard Inuyasha's voice.

"Thanks a lot, asshole." It said.

Sesshoumaru's voice seemed unaffected.

"Seeing as to how you agreed to leave your sector for the weekend, I would also be right to think that you are currently not on assignment."

Miroku raised an eyebrow.

"Em… Yes, that's correct."

The monk had a sinking feeling he knew what the youkai leader wanted. Miroku braced himself as Sesshoumaru spoke again.

"Good. Because as of tomorrow, you will be. I've issued an order to Chief Kaede. Like Inuyasha, you will now be taking orders from me. A rough mission outline has been sent to her to be passed on to you. Be in Sengoku City no later than noon. You will receive a full briefing when you arrive."

There went his two-day vacation.

* * *

_**Some time later…**_

_Beep. Beep._

It was repetitive.

_Beep._

Irritating.

_Beep. Beep._

The alarm clock from which it came joined its broken predecessors on the floor below when a strong hand swooped down upon its unsuspecting form with a vengeance. No matter. It had served its purpose. The sleeping hanyou forced his tired body out of bed and into the shower. The sun had started to rise. Soft light filtered in from beneath his room's dark curtains. It was still dark inside and the light from his bathroom assaulted ill-adjusted human eyes. Inuyasha growled and cursed his weaker side.

The hanyou emerged from his morning shower a few minutes later refreshed, albeit grumpy. That had been the first two hours of sleep he'd had in days. It wore on his human body.

The half blood got changed in a sluggish and distracted fashion. Twice, he tried without success to shove his head into the sleeve of his colourfully worded white T-shirt. He almost put his jeans on backward. The whole procedure of getting dressed took him a gruelling five minutes after which, Inuyasha dragged himself out of his room and down the dormitory buildings' stairs. His stomach growled relentlessly and had been for most of the night before. The half demon-turned human boy pressed his hand over his mid-section to quell the sound. He could feel his ribs through the thin fabric of his shirt. Oh, woe was he. A teenage boy was never meant to survive on a mere sandwich for the entire length of one night. His metabolism screamed to be put to work once more.

The hanyou was cautious when he reached the cafeteria doors. He pushed them open a crack and peeped in. Nothing. Confident that a repeat of last night's episode would not take place, Inuyasha strode into the large room and stole one of Myouga's famous sandwiches from the backroom.

Stomach appeased, he headed for the teacher's lounge. It was time for him to take over guard duty from Jaken but first…

Inuyasha made a little detour in the direction of the infirmary.

* * *

_**Some More Time Later…**_

It was taboo for a monk to curse. Miroku knew that. But he did so anyway. Silently.

He'd arrived at his destination two hours before noon. The monk decided that he hated modern day transport. He would have liked to have delayed his scheduled meeting with Inuyasha's brother but no. That bullet train had to be so damn fast. He hadn't even been able to get a decent nap on board.

Sesshoumaru had insisted that he make his arrival as low-key as possible. The demon leader in question had arranged for him to be sent to his office in government headquarters for a full briefing. By then the monk had been tired and hungry. He'd been afraid of dozing off while he received the mission outline. Sesshoumaru's monotonous voice would have seen to that. But the dog demon had merely dropped a stack of papers and a compact disk upon his lap and strode off to do… whatever it was that he did. Miroku had eyed the inch-thick report, unable to decide if it was any better than a monologue from the Taisho heir.

At first, his only consolation had been the small hope that maybe he'd be able to meet his dream date in Higurashi Kagome but alas, that too was shattered when Sesshoumaru uttered one sentence.

"Unlike Inuyasha, Houshi, you will not be in close contact with the Higurashi children. _One _idiot has enough trouble keeping a low profile as it is."

Now he had nothing to look forward to.

He should have seen it coming. Every time Inuyasha got one of his bright ideas, there'd always be trouble for him. Miroku had made solemn vows time and time again, to cut all ties with the hanyou after every escapade that had turned sour in the past ten years. As he'd received his punishments, whether it'd been doing two hundred one-armed push ups or sitting through one of Chief Kaede's frightening lectures, he'd sworn each time, never to let Inuyasha drag him into trouble ever again. And now here he was. Nothing had changed.

_'This is **so **the last straw!'_

Miroku grudgingly started on the first of a hundred and twenty-two pages. Font size: eight.

* * *

Inuyasha tapped distractedly on his laptop keyboard, switching the surveillance screens and monitoring the comings and goings of weekend-crazed students through the school's front gates. 

He wondered if Miroku had arrived yet. It was nearly noon.

A separate window blinked on inside his computer screen on which his brother's impassive face appeared.

"Houshi is in my office reading the mission report as we speak."

Inuyasha held back a snicker. He'd seen Sesshoumaru's report. The hanyou could just imagine Miroku tearing his hair out in frustration. His brother continued.

"Also, he's confirmed something for me."

"What?"

Inuyasha's eyebrow raised in question.

"You are _not _to, under any circumstance, let Higurashi Kagome know of the nature of her powers. Are we clear on this?"

Inuyasha didn't know how it was possible for his brother to look so threatening without breaking that expressionless mask of his. The half-blood frowned.

"What's so bad about her knowing about her powers? It'll give us an advantage over the killer if she can use them properly."

Sesshoumaru glared at him.

"I am aware of that, mutt. But from what I've gathered from your monk friend, it would be advisable that she remains unaware of the extent of her abilities."

Despite his obvious lack of enthusiasm for the case, Miroku's explanation had been firm. Based on Higurashi Kagome's records and the fact that the girl had not been identified by the magic-handler's authority at a younger age, it would have been logical to conclude that her powers, as unusual as the case may be, had manifested themselves only recently.

Her case was a strange one. Most people, like Miroku and Kaede, would have been aware of their powers since birth. However, it seemed Higurashi Kagome hadn't even had the slightest inkling of their existence. Until now.

Which would explain why the president's daughter had such sparse control over her abilities. Usually, a child with magic-handling skills would have learned at a very young age to adapt themselves for maximum control of their powers. The reason was obvious.

"Children neither have the mental nor physical reservations that most adults develop as they grow up," the monk had reasoned.

It was much like learning a new language. An infant being taught a brand new form of speech would learn many times quicker with much less a chance of forgetting than an adult trying to do the same thing. In a similar way, magic-handlers needed to hone their skills from infancy. Their powers would grow with them. Become part of their very beings.

Higurashi Kagome had not had that privilege. The late materialization of her powers meant that her body viewed them as foreign and unwanted. An anomaly in her otherwise perfectly-functional person and therefore, a threat. With severe hormonal fluctuations from immense negative emotions, her powers were given a means of being released from their confines within her.

Sporadic bursts of strong purifying magic had been the result.

Letting the girl know the extent of her powers would make her overly conscious about them. Miroku's explanation to the white haired demon had been simple.

"Magic handling is… instinctive. It's like breathing or blinking or moving or in your case, changing your body into its canine form. You don't consciously _will _those things to happen. They come naturally to you. Half the time we aren't even aware we're doing half the things our body does. You don't have to _think_ before making them happen. You just… make them happen."

Sesshoumaru finished up with a contemplative glance at his brother.

"Higurashi Kagome has more of a chance of putting her powers to use if she is not consciously aware of them. If the killer were to attack again, it is more than likely that her body will react by itself to the threat. We need not interfere."

"Right. Right"

Inuyasha was sorry he'd asked. One silly question and he'd gotten an earful of factual mumbo jumbo that he neither needed nor cared for. He remembered something and shot up from his half-slouched position to face his brother properly.

"Oh yeah. I ran a check on Higurashi girl's medical files from the school's infirmary this morning. The wench's been in pretty good shape for most of her life but there's a period of time around the beginning of this year when she went for this whole bunch of unscheduled check ups at Inari General. So I'm thinking either she got severely uncharacteristically sick or maybe that's the time her powers started showing themselves."

Sesshoumaru raised an eyebrow.

"And this will help our investigation, how?"

Inuyasha shrugged.

"I just thought it would be useful to know. I don't have any details. Someone's going to have to run down to the hospital for the actual files."

At this the half-blood shot a pointed look at his on-screen brother. Who in turn, shut his eyes.

"I don't see the point. We already know about her abilities. If no one's talked thus far, the doctors probably didn't find anything note worthy about her."

Inuyasha huffed. All that snooping for nothing. His brother wasn't even going to try and make use of the information he'd gathered. Sesshoumaru checked his watch.

"I will be in touch again after my meeting with Toutousai. Perhaps Houshi will have done a full analysis of the drug by then. In the mean time, keep out of trouble, mutt."

Inuyasha nearly stuck his tongue out at the screen.

* * *

Miroku's eyelids felt like they weighed a tonne. They were drooping. Drooping. He snapped awake at the sensation of falling when gravity caused his head to pitch forward. Miroku reread the sixth sentence of paragraph three hundred and ninety-eight on page one hundred and twelve. The same one he'd been on for the past five minutes. After his fourth attempt, the monk tossed the pile of papers down in a huff. He'd stop trying. What was the use? Sure the case was intriguing and all. But things just weren't registering anymore. 

Sesshoumaru cast a brief glance at the monk from his position in the driver's seat. Currently the two were making their way towards Sengoku's Military Research Facility, where the dog demon had made an appointment with the master inventor, Toutousai. They'd been on the road all of about fifteen minutes.

The monk was unused to such long silences. It was just his luck that Sesshoumaru had never been one for useless banter. And so, Miroku settled for staring out the window. He saw the passing buildings, seeming to compete for the honour of reaching the heavens. He eyed the congested roads, full of people rushing to get everywhere but ending up going nowhere. He cringed at the unsightly fumes that their vehicles produced. They veiled the blue of the sky with their own sickly tone. This place was one huge, saturated heap of concrete and metal that was too much grey and too little green. And though it was an awfully negative thought for someone like himself, Miroku hated the city.

He turned his gaze away. Shutting his eyes, the monk contemplated his new assignment. Since neither Sesshoumaru nor Inuyasha knew purifying magic quite as well as he did, he would play their encyclopaedia if Higurashi Kagome should show any other sign of another outburst. And of course, if the killer's infamous suit was indeed affected by purifying magic, he'd be sent to the front lines. Sure, it was an important enough job, but it was just so… bland. Covert operations were supposed to be interesting. Espionage, women, country-hopping. All that jazz.

Instead, he'd be cooped up in a lab with some stuffy old scientist who Inuyasha was certain was insane. Miroku sighed. Life was so disheartening.

The pair arrived at their destination thirty uncomfortable minutes later.

* * *

Inuyasha leaned against the soccer field fence. He could see Higurashi Souta practicing his dribbling with a fellow member of the sports club. The kid was decent. Though his technique wasn't entirely right, he had an accurate pass and almost never let his focus leave the game. Not too shabby for a nine-year-old. 

His sister watched from the bleachers on the other end of the field from Inuyasha, shouting encouragements and the occasional teasing jest. The hanyou couldn't help but feel a hint of respect for the girl. While others her age were off in the city shopping and going wild for the weekend, she had chosen instead to come to juvenile soccer practice to watch her brother play. Then again, he reminded himself, there was also the fact that there really weren't many other places she could have been that wouldn't have put her safety in jeopardy.

Inuyasha was ever the cynical one.

He'd felt uncomfortable about Souta's out of school soccer practices from the very beginning. The junior league trained in a large soccer field three miles south of SNIE. Inuyasha didn't like it. The area was too wide. Too open. There were too many unknown people in the crowd. But then again Inuyasha could somewhat understand the Higurashis' need to leave the academy once in a while. No one wanted to be cooped up in an institute full of old stiffs every day of the week. That still didn't mean that he agreed with their decision.

The ever-vigilant half-blood scanned the surrounding area again. His ears twitched beneath his blue and red baseball cap. He'd placed himself strategically out of the crowd's line of vision. From his place behind the unused goal post, he could view everything that happened without being noticed. When one's hair was long and white, one tended to attract unwanted attention. Inuyahsa couldn't afford to blow his cover.

The half-blood paid no heed when he felt the presence of another person coming up beside him. The fence sunk back a tad when another body leant back against it in a similar fashion to the hanyou. The voice that spoke was unfamiliar.

"Beautiful day isn't it?"

Inuyasha's nose scrunched itself up when the strong smell of perfume assaulted it. His head turned away from the newcomer as he exhaled in reflex. The scent made him slightly nauseous.

"The sun's shining. The grass is green… and Wow! You have really pretty hair. Is it natural?"

Inuyasha growled when he felt a hand fingering the ends of his white mane.

"…Yes. Don't touch it."

The hanyou jerked his head away. The person, a woman by the sound of her gave a short chuckle.

"My, my, my. Aren't we the coy one?"

"…"

"So tell me. What's a cutie like your self doing hiding back here? Do you know one of the kids in the league?"

Inuyasha was getting annoyed. But he figured if he didn't look at the speaker, she'd eventually lose interest and leave him the hell alone. Her perfume was going to give him a migraine. He wanted to move. Badly. But he also needed to stay out of sight. He gave the woman a curt reply, hoping to dissuade whatever agenda she was on.

"Yes. Now will you go away?"

The woman squealed in delight and latched onto his arm.

"Aw! You're trying to be all distant. That's so cute! Go out with me!"

"Huh? No!"

"Aw. Come on."

"No."

"…Yes."

"What the fuck? No!"

"Yes, yes!"

"_No_."

"You know you want to…"

The hanyou felt a vein pop in his forehead. He spun round.

"Look, lady! Whatever you're pulling, I'm not int-"

Inuyasha stopped short. That was _no _woman. The person still had his arm clutched tightly to their chest. A disturbingly non-squishy chest. The hanyou's eyes widened in realization and he yanked his arm back in shock.

_'Holy Shit.'_

The _boy _in front of him looked affronted.

"_Lady?_ Ew. I'm one hundred percent male, honey."

Dumbfounded. That's what Inuyasha was. He'd been hit on by a _guy_? A cross-dressing, horribly gender-confused teenager with bad perfume?

_'Shit.'_

"What's the matter? Cat got your pretty little tongue?"

When he received no reply, the boy stared at him curiously before bursting out into a knowing smile.

"Oh, I get it. You're what you call it… hopho…homo…homophobic! Aw. That's even better!"

The smile turned sly. And the boy leaned up to whisper into Inuyasha's hidden ear.

"More fun for me then."

By then, Inuyasha had gathered enough of his wit to make a retort.

"What? No! Go away!"

The hanyou pushed the persistent teenager away but the boy's cheeky grin merely grew in width.

"Was that _no_, you're not homophobic or _no, _you won't have fun with me?"

"It was _no _I don't want you anywhere near me. So skoot."

"Playing hard to get, I see. Well, I can work with that."

Inuyasha felt his irritation grow once more.

"Look, kid. Sorry to burst your bubble, alright, but I'm straight."

"Straight? You sure?"

"Yes."

"How straight are you?"

"As an arrow!"

The cross-dresser seemed unaffected. He waved the comment off boredly.

"Sure, sure. That's what they _all _say. But I distinctly remember you trying to shoo me off even when you thought I was… female."

The last word was said with disgust. The boy tried to latch onto his arm again and Inuyasha slinked further away, glancing round frantically for possible means of escape. No. He wasn't starting to panic. Not at all.

When she-boy spoke again, something had changed in his voice. It grew softer. Colder.

"Why so nervous _Nishijima-chan_? You seemed so much bolder last night."

Inuyasha turned to face the kid so fast he nearly had a whiplash.

"What did you say?"

His name! How did he know his name? Last night? He couldn't be a kid from school could he? Inuyasha didn't recognise him. What's more, he wasn't in his human form! How could the boy know who he was? Inuyasha stood his ground with narrowed eyes as the cross-dressing teenager advanced on him.

"You pulled quite the sneaky little stunt. Breaking into Ban-chan's room, hanging out the window, disguising your self as a human afterward. Bankotsu-kun didn't even notice until after you'd left! He has a hidden camera, you know."

The boy stepped right up to Inuyasha and slapped two hands on both his shoulders in a gesture of congratulation.

"You should take great pride in what you have accomplished. But I must say, Bankotsu-kun isn't quite as impressed by you as I am."

The make-up sportingmale frowned.

"I've always told him never to get angry. It's bad for his complexion. But I guess you must have pissed him off good."

It was disturbing how the boy's grinning expression never even faltered as he relayed his message. The kid reminded Inuyasha of a smiling version of his brother. Pretty boy with only one facial appearance. Inuyasha growled.

"Who the hell are you?"

The boy shot him a mischievous wink.

"Wouldn't you like to know."

Inuyasha brow twitched in response.

"What the fuck do you want?"

The boy's smile turned mega watt. It looked carefree and mischievous. For a second Inuyasha felt inclined to lower his guard.

"Why _you _of course!"

Then, the hanyou saw his eyes. There was something so distinctly _wrong _about them. They held neither the warmth nor naivety that one would have expected to see in someone his age. He had to have been no more than fifteen.

"At least… that's what I would have wanted to say. Ban-chan prefers otherwise."

The hanyou bit back a sneer. It would do him no good to become angry. He'd have to play it cool.

"Heh. Whatever that bastard wants, he's not getting out of me."

"Wooh. Feisty. I'm beginning to like you more and more."

Perhaps it was his slightly hunched posture. Perhaps it was his shorter frame. Perhaps it was his effeminate nature. Or maybe it was simply that he was human. Whatever the reason, Inuyasha should _not _have underestimated the other boy. Because, quick as lightning, he found himself being slammed up against the fence behind him, held in place by the still-smiling boy's slender right hand around his neck. It was wrong. Someone that slight in stature should _not _have had so much strength. Inuyasha had poised his arms and legs to retaliate when he felt the cold bite of steel at the side of his neck.

"Don't make a scene, soldier boy. Come quietly. Or I won't be able to guarantee the safety of the children on that field behind us. Argh! That sounded so cheesy…"

Inuyasha's eyes snapped forward in alarm. Soldier boy?

"That's right. We know more than you would like, _Inuyasha Taisho_. I must say, that suits you so much better. Nishijima is a horrid name."

The hanyou started to growl.

"Did Bankotsu send you to do his dirty work? Hm? He get his kicks out of killing whelps?"

"Oh heavens no. That's disgusting. I just said that for the effect. But then again you're not one to talk are you? Someone from such a prestigious family as your own. Resorting to petty theft! I mean, Inu-chan! Breaking and entering! Oh, what would your parents say?"

Despite the boy's playful appearance. Inuyasha knew he could not let his guard down. He'd never seen a human move so fast before. Not even Miroku. The teenager in front of him could not be taken lightly.

"My parents are dead. How the fuck did you find out about me?"

"Well, let's just say you aren't the only one who can outsmart a computer Inu-chan. Oh, and good job accessing the principal's database by the way. I guess that little skill must come with your military training."

A loud whistle sounding from behind caused both boys to glance back. Practice had ended. Inuyasha seized his chance to lash out at his momentarily distracted aggressor. The boy jumped back in time to avoid getting seriously hurt. Nevertheless, Inuyasha's claws managed to rip through his shirt and graze the skin of his chest.

"Oh ho! You're a sneaky little bugger."

If he was in pain, he showed no outward sign of it. There was little doubt about it now. The kid was an adept fighter. Or at the very least, he had the reflexes of one.

"Where is Bankotsu?"

Inuyasha demanded. He couldn't risk breaking cover. He couldn't risk his brother's operation. He had to find out how much Bankotsu knew. The boy's make-up covered eyes crinkled in delight.

"Well, I'll show you if you promise not to pull a stunt like that again. I mean, it was fun and all, but I really don't like ruining my clothes. You totally spoiled my top."

The hanyou growled.

"Fine. Vain little shit."

"Why, thank you. Oh. And just to make sure you don't try anything funny, Ban-chan said you have to turn human."

"What!"

The cross-dressing teen huffed in reply.

"Yes. I was adverse to it as you are. I mean, your human form is cute and all, but you are so much more appealing as you are now."

At this, the boy reached forward and tugged on a lock of ashen hair playfully. Inuyasha growled and slapped his hand away. He hesitantly complied with pretty boy's request.

"There! Happy? Now take me to see the bastard."

"Potty mouthed little doggy, you are. Alright, let's go."

He latched onto Inuyasha's arm again and the half-demon promptly tried to pull away. But his grip was unrelenting.

"Oh, you can call me Jakotsu by the way."

Ginkotsu, Jakotsu, Bankotsu. Inuyasha was starting to see a connection here.

* * *

Kagome waited patiently for Souta to emerge from the changing rooms. It was good to see her brother smiling and having fun again. The boy had scarcely been able to eat when they'd first arrived at SNIE. This was a tremendous improvement. 

Something in the distance caught her eye. A figure on the other end of the field. Kagome squinted.

The first thing she noted was the familiar long, black hair. Then she recognised the confident walk and the lean physique. There was no mistaking it. The person emerging from behind the old goal post was none other than…

"Nishijima."

The name left her lips in a whisper as a small smile spread across her face. It was him! The elusive schoolmate she'd become so intrigued with. He appeared to be talking with someone behind the goal post that Kagome could not make out. Gathering her courage, the late president's daughter rose from the bench she'd been occupying and made towards the other end of the field.

"Miss Kagome?"

Her bodyguard's question failed to stop her advancement.

"It's alright Kouran. I'm just going to talk to that person over there."

She pointed the boy she knew as Nishijima out for her protector to see. Kouran gave a knowing smile and decided not to follow. As long as the girl stayed within her line of vision. Kagome was a mixture of anxiety and nervous excitement. This might be the only chance in a long while that she'd get to speak to the boy. She wanted to make good of it.

As she neared her intended destination, Kagome came to realise that the boy, Nishijima, seemed to be in a heated argument with whoever was behind the wide goal post. He seemed extremely agitated and Kagome wondered what he and his companion could have been arguing about. She hesitated. Maybe… this was a bad time? Her confident stride slowed the nearer she got to the pair.

"-amn it! No, I will _not _let you touch my ears after we're done!"

What on earth?

Another voice, higher in pitch than Nishijima's filtered through the air.

"Aww, come on, Inu-chan!"

Inu? As in dog? Kagome could see the owner of the second voice somewhat better now. The person was tugging on Nishijima's arm and whining in a childish voice. The boy seemed annoyed.

"Can we fucking _go _already! There's places I got to be!"

_That _voice was distinctly Nishijima's. Kagome wondered what the two were talking about.

"No. Not until you agree."

Huh? Agree to what? Was Nishijima so adverse to someone touching his ears? Or had Kagome just heard wrong?

"You little… _FINE_!"

The squeal that followed was somewhat… loud. But all too happy. Nishijima started to turn in her direction to avoid the sound. Kagome had been about to call out the black-haired boy's name when a figure launched itself onto him, nearly knocking him off his feet. Its arms wound themselves tightly round the boy's neck.

"Yay! I love you, Inu-chan!"

As she drew closer, Kagome realised the person whom she had first thought a girl, was in fact, _not_ a girl. The boy looked feminine enough from a distance, but there was no way Kagome could ignore the slim hips and broader shoulders.

It was then, that enlightenment dawned on the president's daughter and she stopped short.

"Oh my god."

The soft exclamation drew the attention of one _very_ frazzled Inuyasha who, despite the huge load hanging off him, spun round in reflex to find himself staring at a wide-eyed Higurashi Kagome.

_'Oh fuck…'_

Kagome didn't know what to do. Nishijima himself looked like a deer caught in very bright head lights. She cursed her stupidity. She should have realized the minute she'd heard Nishijima's partner call him "Inu-chan". It was now obvious to her. It was a pet name! If she'd seen this sooner she would never have had to face such an awkward situation. She'd walked in on a lover's spat! What on earth was she supposed to say?

Both at a loss for words, the pair could only stand and stare as each of their minds took time to recover. It seemed an eternity before Jakotsu, distracted from his assault by Inuyasha's stillness, unlatched himself from the half-blood's neck and turned to face the newcomer in curiosity.

"Inu-chan, who's that?"

This snapped both the half-blood and the girl out of their respective reveries. Kagome's eyes widened even more when she took in the state of the two boys. Nishijima's hair was in disarray. The unknown boy's clothes were ruffled and his top was ripped. Oh god. What had they been doing back there? Kagome felt so much blood rise to her cheeks that they burned like fire.

"I'm really sorry! I didn't mean to interrupt anything. I- I'll leave you two alone now…"

As the flustered girl turned to leave, Inuyasha looked on in puzzlement. Why had she seemed so embarras-

_'Oh **hell** no…'_

No. This couldn't be happening! Against his better judgement, the half-blood found himself calling out to the girl.

"No! Fuck. It's not what you think!"

Kagome stopped walking. Too embarrassed to turn around. She felt she had to make things right one way or another. After all, the whole situation _had _been her fault.

"Em… Don't worry Nishijima-sempai. I won't tell anyone."

With that, she took off for the other end of the field, wanting to get as far away from the couple as possible. If she had to face the boy one more time that day she swore her face would burn right off. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she realised that she'd not only been embarrassed. She'd been… disappointed.

'_Damn it, Kagome! Trust you to develop a crush on a gay guy .'_

* * *

_Crash!_

Inuyasha was not pissed. He was murderous.

_Smash!_

Inuyasha was not angry. He was teeth-grindingly, fist-clenchingly, trash can-smashingly _furious_.

"Oi Inu-chan. You okay?"

The half-blood could not even manage a coherent response. So he kicked a dumpster instead.

"I guess not."

Inuyasha found himself angry at Jakotsu for being so damn clingy. He found himself annoyed at Higurashi Kagome for jumping to conclusions. The wench hadn't even given him time to explain! She'd run off and left his mood crushed. Inuyasha was mad at himself for caring. It really shouldn't have mattered to him what the girl thought. In fact, this new development could have worked to his advantage! Now she would probably lose interest in him.

However, strangely enough, the hanyou couldn't find it in him to feel relieved. No sane, straight guy liked it when their sexuality was questioned! And Inuyasha was no exception. He clenched his fists and stomped on ahead, leaving a trail of destruction in his wake. Jakotsu dodged flying trash can lids and skirted over-turned rubbish bins. The cross-dresser sighed. Ever since that silly girl had shown up, the half-demon just hadn't been fun anymore. He no longer responded to his playful advances. No longer retaliated or became flustered by his jibes.

Inuyasha had stalked so far ahead that his human ears almost missed Jakotsu's call.

"Inu-chan! You've passed it already!"

The half-demon spun round and saw Jakotsu signalling to a drab, old warehouse on the riverfront. He growled and did a one-eighty.

The building was run-down. Its metal doors were orange with rust and their hinges creaked loudly when Jakotsu pushed them open. Inuyasha stepped inside cautiously, feeling vulnerable in his human form. He was distinctly aware when his guide pushed the doors shut after their entrance. The half-blood scanned the area for other possible means of escape. The place was empty. It had numerous large windows high on each of the building's four walls. Inuyasha doubted that he'd be able to reach them in his human form. The sound of their footsteps echoed in the silence, for there was nothing in the room to quell the sound. Not one thing. Which was why Bankotsu's voice resonated loudly.

"Well well. Look what the snake dragged in."

Jakotsu grinned…

"Ban-chan!"

…And glomped the boy who had just entered. Bankotsu ruffled his hair affectionately. It was a pretty amusing sight considering Jakotsu's taller frame. Inuyasha became aware of the presence of two other individuals. One to his right and one to his left. So. The bastard had brought company. Even in the periphery of his vision, Inuyasha could see that the two others were reasonably big-sized. He raised his guard as Bankotsu sauntered up to him.

"So, mutt. You're the one who's been snooping around my files."

Inuyasha eyed the shorter boy coolly. Bankotsu started to circle him.

"Now, that, I could have forgiven. But then you had to come into my room and take the liberty of stealing one of my little babies."

The half-blood scoffed at Bankotsu's terminology.

"Nearly gave me the slip too. Fortunately for myself, Jakotsu here had a little something installed in my dormitory that, _un_fortunately for you, you failed to notice."

The camera. Inuyasha cursed his carelessness. Bankotsu continued with his monologue.

"So I got a little pissed off right and got Jakotsu here to do some background research on the _bastard who dared to steal from me_. You know, so we could smack you and maybe some close relations up some for the insult. I knew your school name had to be fake because a half-demon has _never _attended Sengoku National before."

Bankotsu sounded smug. The bastard.

"But imagine my surprise when my man digs up some interesting facts buried underneath all that fake crap you used to hide your identity with. It must be frustrating for a government lap dog to have to pose as one of us isn't it? How does it feel to be _just like everyone else_?"

Inuyasha was starting to get bored.

"How about getting to the point?"

Bankotsu rounded on him.

"The point?"

He grinned a frightening grin.

"Alright."

If Inuyasha had not been human at that moment, he would have sensed the huge metal fist that swung towards his lower back. The force of the blow sent him careening forward and left him sprawled in agony on the rough floor. His arms shook with the effort of lifting himself up again. They were relieved of their burden when the half blood was hauled to his feet by two very strong individuals.

"Let me introduce you to some friends of mine, hanyou."

He gestured to the hulking beast of a human being holding Inuyasha up on the right.

"The big one there is Kyokotsu. He's killed fifteen people."

Next he pointed to the boy on the hanyou's left side who sported an iron knuckle.

"And that's my brother Ginkotsu. His fist hurts doesn't it. I'll let your back do the talking."

Despite his disposition, Inuyasha's pride demanded that he not go down without a fight.

"Heh. Ugly little fucker. Must be in the genes."

Ginkotsu roared and delivered a sound punch to the hanyou's side. Inuyasha felt a rib or two crack. He didn't cry out. Ginkotsu had been about to deliver a second blow, but his brother's voice stopped him.

"Ginkotsu."

He lowered his fist. Jakotsu stood to the side, watching as Bankotsu turned to Inuyasha once more.

"That mouth of yours is going to get you into some _serious _trouble one day, Taisho. How about we do you a favour and teach it some respect right now?"

Inuyasha's head snapped to the side when Bankotsu's fist connected with his jaw. Despite the ringing in his ears, the half-blood could hear Jakotsu's protest.

"Aw, Ban-chan! Not his face!"

It didn't sound desperate or pleading. Merely… playful. Just like it always had. Bankotsu cast his friend a grin before turning his attention back to the black-haired half-human.

"Hm… Some other body part then."

Bankotsu paced round the panting boy. Contemplative. Running his eyes up and down his body. He stopped in front of Inuyasha's right hand, whose arm was being held up by Kyokotsu.

"So, Inuyasha Taisho. How do you intend to pay back what you stole from me? Got any money on you?"

Inuyasha growled. This wasn't about payback. If it was then Bankotsu wouldn't have been so interested in his being a government sent individual. From what they'd been spouting so far, it appeared they knew nothing of his and Sesshoumaru's case. So why then were they inclined to doing this? Bankotsu definitely had a motive. He didn't look like the type to take pleasure out of senseless beatings. Inuyasha just needed to find out what their agenda was.

"As entertaining as this is, what do you _really _want, bastard?"

Bankotsu didn't answer. He eyed Inuyasha's right hand contemplatively.

"Is this the hand that stole from me?"

He walked round to the half-blood's other side.

"Or is it this one?"

Inuyasha flipped him off.

"Hmm… We'll never be sure will we? Break them both."

The hanyou couldn't help his cry when he felt both his wrists snap. His eyes watered but he raised them defiantly.

"You see Taisho, I don't entirely appreciate you government folk snooping around in my affairs."

"What the hell are you talking about, asshole! This can't be about one petty pill."

The boy rounded on him. It was unnerving. His eyes. They held no trace of emotion. They held no humanity.

"You're absolutely right. This isn't about that. This is us trying to get a clear message through to you government scum."

Bankotsu slipped a hand behind the hanyou's neck and yanked Inuyasha's head forward.

_"Keep out of Shichinintai business."_

His voice was menacing. Laced with underlying threat. The black-haired boy finished by delivering a sound punch to Inuyasha's abdomen. He straightened and stepped back, leavingthe hanyou's human body gasping for breath.

Despite his outward appearance,Inuyasha's mind was elsewhere. Shichinintai? Where had he heard that before? His eyes narrowed as he racked his brains. It was a pretty lame name. It should be easy to recall! Finally, his mind conjured up the image of a newspaper article from around a year ago. There'd been some sort of murder in a neighbouring country. The only reason the piece had caught Inuyasha's attention was that the fact that rest of the paper had been so uninteresting. And he had been bored.

"Shichinintai suspected." The spread had said.

Inuyasha cursed. He had never hated his aversion to reading. Until now. If only he'd committed more of the story to memory! He'd learned only that the Shichinintai was a seven-man operation.

_'Hn. Duh.'_

They were tantamount to your basic mercenaries. They'd do anything for the right price. Which made some of their actions rather… illegal.

His mind snapped back to the situation at hand. So Bankotsu and his lackeys thought that he'd been sent to investigate the Shichinintai? Inuyasha nearly chuckled. What cocky little bastards. They thought a couple of murders and a drug bust was enough to herald the attention of the government of Sengoku?

Something struck Inuyasha then. The Shichinintai were criminals for hire. They did all sorts of dirty work for the right amount of money. From what it appeared during his earlier encounter with Jakotsu, its members might have been extremely capable fighters. A single word flashed in Inuyasha's mind and the hanyou smirked. _**Suspects**._

"What are you so happy about?"

Ginkotsu growled in question. Inuyasha's smirk grew. Time for a little test.

"Oh nothing. Your ugly mug just amuses me, that's all."

The boy nearly screamed in rage. His slightly deformed face must have been a sore subject after all. He relented his hold on the hanyou to swing a muscular arm back before sending it careening towards Inuyasha's head. Its fist found itself connecting with Kyokotsu's surprised face instead when the intended recepient of the blow, seizing his opportunity, had yanked his arm free and ducked down.

Kyokotsu reeled back in pain, relinquishing his grip on Inuyasha's other arm. The hanyou leapt away and immediately punched in the reversion code into his wrist band. It was difficult with two broken wrists but the transformation into his half-demon form nullified the initial pain. Inuyasha went straight in for the kill. Claws poised, he leapt over the hulking pair, aiming for their leader instead.

Bankotsu's relaxed posture and easy smirk should have alarmed him. But Inuyasha had been going too fast to care. He was met in mid assault by a grinning Jakotsu, wielding the most unusual weapon…

* * *


	12. Physical Test

_**Puppet Without Strings**_

* * *

**Chapter 11**

Inuyasha felt the bones in his arm jar violently when its claws collided with the flat of the strangest blade he had ever seen. The sickening scratch of bone on steel lasted a mere second before the narrow piece of metal that had parried the swoop of the hanyou's claws jerked and retracted.

"So impatient, Inu-chan!"

Jakotsu admonished playfully somewhere to his left. Inuyasha growled when he felt the throbbing in his right arm. His intended target's lips quirked in mockery at the hanyou's failed attempt to do him harm. Bankotsu hadn't moved an inch.

The force of the blow, amplified ten-fold by the sheer velocity that the hanyou had been moving at before he'd been thwarted, reverberated through his body as he flipped to the side. In that instant, Inuyasha, dehumanised as he was, became aware once again of the fact that his wrists had been broken only minutes before. The pain had barely time to fully register before his canine ears twisted instinctively round as it picked up the whizzing of metal through air several feet behind him. Years of combat experience kicked in, as strong legs propelled the half demon into the air and away from danger, scarcely saving their owner from being halved by Jakotsu's next deadly strike.

The boy's weapon was like no other Inuyasha had ever encountered before. Its blade comprised not of just one single long strip of sharpened metal like other swords, but appeared multi-parted, made up of _several _deadly blades, each a replica of the next, all linked together. With a small heave of his arm, Jakotsu sent the tip of the sword barrelling towards an air-borne Inuyasha, who promptly twisted his body out of the way just in time. But the hanyou's triumphant smirk fell when he realised that his opponent was far from finished. The impromptu evasive manoeuvre had unbalanced him. He found himself plummeting to the ground at a completely unsafe angle, leaving his body vulnerable to Jakotsu's next attack as it made its swift decent. The still-smiling boy gave a flick of his wrist and the end of the blade twisted round to intercept Inuyasha in mid-fall. The hanyou felt the cruel bite of steel when it sliced past his chest, opening up a sizeable amount of flesh that oozed sticky crimson.

"I guess that's a point to me, Inu-chan!"

In barely under a minute, first blood had gone to Jakotsu. Skinny, feminine, harmless-looking Jakotsu. Inuyasha felt his mood sour even more as he landed on his side clutching a hand to the gash in his torso. He rolled clear of another swooping slash from the all-too-delighted boy and forced himself to ignore the pain. If anything, this snapped him to his senses. He realised that he could _not _afford to underestimate his opponent for a second time.

Jakotsu's weapon seemed unstoppable. It allowed him to neither retreat from nor attack its handler. All Inuyasha found him self able to do was dodge and duck each equally powerful swipe at him.

What alarmed the half blood the most as he evaded his assailant's next dozen swipes however, was not the long reach of the unusual weapon, but the sheer amount of power and accuracy Jakotsu was able to muster _despite _the length of its blade.

Inuyasha now realised that the reason he had never seen a weapon like that before was because _no one else _would have been able to use such a thing. The sheer weight of a blade like that would have made the weapon un-balanced, its length and dexterity would have made it cumbersome, like an oversized length of chain. Limp and heavy.

It worked like a whip, swift to cause pain, and swift to escape its opponent's retaliation. But Jakotsu's sword had to have been dozens of times heavier and ten times longer than any mere whip, yet the kid manoeuvred it with ease.

Had he not seen it with his own eyes, Inuyasha would have been hard-pressed to believe what the human boy was capable of. With a slight tug of his skinny wrist, Jakotsu would demonstrate his mastery over the tool. The extended blade would twist and change direction without so much as a hitch. Inuyasha would barely have time get his bearings after dodging one attack before the next one would fly towards him unrelenting from a completely different direction. There was hardly time to think.

However, he didn't think that Jakotsu had really gotten serious yet. He appeared to be toying with him, like a cat taunting a mouse before it swooped in for the kill. Through it all, the boy hadn't stopped smiling. And this irked Inuyasha.

But it would do him no good to lose his head. Like all fighters, Jakotsu had a weakness. And, like every other strong opponent Inuyasha had ever faced, that weakness was over-confidence.

Inuyasha would let Jakotsu underestimate him for a little longer. He would play along and observe.

* * *

Miroku stared round the humongous facility in absolute unbelieving awe. 

Try as he might to keep his jaw in thorough control, it gaped open shamelessly as his eyes appraised each smoothly efficient and mouth-wateringly high-tech piece of equipment they had the pleasure of swooping over. Several times, one of his hands would find itself having to physically restrain its twin from reaching out and running itself over the cool metal of some of the machinery he walked past. The only time his eyes strayed further than two inches from any part of the laboratory was when a group of female interns strolled past.

Had Sesshoumaru not been on his determined quest to find the eccentric inventor, Toutousai amongst the metropolis of weapon-making apparatus, he might have been exasperated. Time changed many things. But it scarcely touched Miroku.

When Kaede had first informed him of Inuyasha's instantaneous, not to mention highly-destructive, bond with the monk so many years ago, Sesshoumaru had been as surprised as his composed persona had allowed him to be. The thought of his uncouth and violent little half-brother mixing with a child bound to walk the path of holiness had seemed surreal and unbelievable. That had been until he'd met the black-haired youth in person. Now Sesshoumaru, being the demon that he was, had been far from obliged to follow in the path of righteousness that Buddhism promoted. However, he'd never before doubted the respectability of the peaceful religion.

Ten year old Houshi Miroku had given him his first real reason to do so.

And it appeared, as the monk eyed up yet another passing female, that a decade of holy instruction hadn't changed a thing. Sesshoumaru stepped out of the main research centre and strode down the next corridor. He stepped through the doorway that led to Toutousai's private laboratory with Miroku in his wake. There, hunched over a small metallic concoction, the old man stood.

"I thought I said I didn't want to be disturbed?"

The voice wasn't irritated, merely inquiring. Sesshoumaru kept on walking forward, his agenda fixed and unwavering in his mind. Miroku was the exact opposite. His starry gaze wandered anywhere and everywhere. Across chemicals and equipment, over blue prints and plans pinned haphazardly across the wall to finally rest on the infamous scientist known only to him as Toutousai.

"We need to ask you some questions, old man."

The inventor glanced up at his two visitors, instantly recognising the controlled voice that had spoken.

"Oh. Sesshoumaru! I haven't seen or heard from you in ages!"

"I spoke to you on the com-link an hour ago."

"Oh right. I was speaking figuratively."

Miroku raised an eyebrow but didn't comment.

"What are you here for again?"

The old man brought a skinny finger up to scratch the top of his head. Sesshoumaru seemed unfazed. Miroku guessed that he must have been used to this.

"Questions."

"Oh right. Fire away then, my boy."

The monk observed that Toutousai had unnaturally poofy eyes. It was strange hearing someone, no matter their age refer to Sesshoumaru as such. The dog demon's serious demeanour and no-nonsense attitude made it hard for people to see him as anything but a full grown adult. Again, Sesshoumaru seemed unaffected. As was typical, he got straight to the point.

"Toutousai. How much do you know of defensive weaponry?"

The old man cast the white haired demon what Miroku guessed was a curious glance. But one could never be sure with Toutousai's crazy eyes.

"In what form?"

Miroku stepped up and held a digitally enhanced photo of the president's assassin to the old inventor's face.

"Protective suit. Full body, including the head. It's bullet-proof. Able to withstand shots from a point four-five calibre semi-automatic; maybe more. _Light; _allows its user free movement and what we're quite certain is optimum speed."

Toutousai stared at him as if he'd grown a third eye.

"Impossible."

Miroku nearly rolled his eyes.

"You're telling us."

Toutousai jabbed a finger into the picture.

"No. I mean literally. That's impossible."

Miroku tilted his head in question.

"How can you be certain?"

The old man still looked at him as if he'd sprouted wings.

"I've been in the business a long time, sonny. Never seen that kind of bullet-proofing material. Its way too thin. Even the most effective light-weight suits have to be of a certain thickness. You know…

Toutousai gestured blindly with his hands.

"…to counter the velocity of a bullet with. Even then, the sheer amount of force that an object travelling at such a high speed would produce would almost definitely cause its user to be affected physically. Severe bruising for example or loss of consciousness."

The old man grabbed the photo with both hands and brought it even closer to his face.

"_That _suit is about the same thickness as cloth. There is absolutely no way it could be made of any kind of bullet-proofing material I know of."

He spent the next few minutes tilting and examining the image. He held it up to the light a few times, as if doing so would provide him with some sort of answer. After a few minutes of nothing, Sesshoumaru, though deep in thought, stepped up and plucked the piece of paper from Toutousai's fingers.

"Toutousai, is it possible for a suit to be… demonised?"

Toutousai's bulging eyes widened even more.

"Huh?"

Sesshoumaru sighed.

"Is it possible for a suit to be magically enhanced… with demon-power."

The old man brought to his beard in consideration.

"Never been done before."

And with good reason too. There was hardly any point. Humans were too vulnerable to magical energy. The _jaki _produced by something like a demonised suit would more likely cause them to go berserk than protect them from external harm. And demons… well, why would a demon need a _demonised_ suit? The idea of using one was far from practical.

However, Sesshoumaru never ignored a hunch.

"It's possible though?"

Miroku stared at the white-haired demon in bemusement. What was Sesshoumaru on about?

"It would need a hell of a lot of youki to be able to stop bullets."

Sesshoumaru wanted a definite answer.

"Is it or is it not possible, old man?"

For the first time that day, Toutousai seemed unsure of himself.

"I can't answer that yet. Perhaps after I do some tests…"

"How long?"

Toutousai pondered. He couldn't even remember half the things on his schedule. That meant that there really wasn't anything of importance to be done. So he guessed he'd be able to make time for the son of one of the few individuals that had been able to earn his respect.

"A week. Two at most."

The dog demon, though not completely satisfied, decided that he would have to make do with that for now. If there was one thing he knew Toutousai did not like, it was not knowing a definite answer to something. He trusted that he'd get his information soon enough. The beeping of his cell phone prevented him from delving too deeply into his thoughts. Sesshoumaru flipped it open with practiced ease.

"Yes."

Jaken's voice filtered through from the other end.

"It's me, Sesshoumaru-sama."

The dog demon frowned and narrowed his eyes. This call was unscheduled. Jaken would not have done so unless… Sesshoumaru sighed in annoyance.

"What's the idiot done now?"

Miroku perked up and turned his head toward Sesshoumaru with great interest. The white haired demon looked blatantly irritated. And he knew of only one person that could have been capable of causing such an obvious show of facial expression in the ever-impassive dog demon. He wondered how much trouble Inuyasha had gotten himself into.

Sesshoumaru's subordinate's reply was hurried.

"Sir, Higurashi Souta and Higurashi Kagome have already returned from the boy's weekly soccer practice. Your brother wasn't with them. It's been almost a half hour since they arrived, but he's still no where to be found, sir."

The dog demon was already moving. His half-brother might not have been the most compliant of souls, but he knew when or when not to go against his orders. Something must have happened. Either that or Inuyasha had found some sort of lead that his idiotic-self had deemed too important to waste time reporting and had gone after it himself. It was just like his brother to act totally on impulse without first thinking the consequences through.

"Give me the location of the soccer field."

As Jaken recited the address, Sesshoumaru committed it to memory. The area wasn't far. He'd probably make it there in fifteen minutes if he avoided the crowded roads and went on foot instead. Miroku struggled to catch up to the dog demon as he strode briskly towards the room's double doors. Sesshoumaru gave one bemused Toutousai a curt nod before flipping his cell phone closed and turning to push one of the panels open.

"Oi, Sesshoumaru! What's going on?"

Miroku's question made him pause. He turned to face the monk.

"Houshi, you are staying here as planned. Arrangements have been made for you to lodge in the staff quarters."

This did not please Miroku. But who was he to disobey a direct order.

"Assist Toutousai in his research and make use of the facilities available to identify Satsugawa Bankotsu's drug."

Toutousai seemed all the more curious.

"Huh? Who authorised that?"

Sesshoumaru responded without a hitch as he turned on his heel and exited the room.

"You did."

"Oh right."

The sound of the door swinging shut permeated the silence the Sesshoumaru had left in his wake. Miroku turned to find the old man scratching his head.

"Eh…what's your name again?"

He sighed.

"Houshi Miroku."

"Oh right. What are we supposed to be doing again?"

Miroku wanted to run after Sesshoumaru and beg to be taken along with him. Like a young child, desperate for his mother's presence on the first day of school. He would never in a million years have thought that he'd willingly choose Sesshoumaru's presence over another. Irony was such a bitch.

* * *

"Inu-chan! Stop jumping around! I want to see you bleed!" 

Jakotsu stomped his foot like a petulant child.

Inuyasha now knew for certain that the boy was not the president's killer. He dodged another slash to his head.

Not only did Jakotsu not fit the official profile given in the assignment report, his fighting style seemed entirely too different. While the nameless assassin had been swift and precise, taking down each individual without missing a beat in one fell swoop, Jakotsu seemed to like to toy with his opponents. The cross-dresser savoured their pain, revelled in the control he held over his deadly weapon.

Inuyasha had originally intended for his impromptu attack to test the fighting techniques of the various members present in the warehouse. However, it seemed his reckless decision was not paying off as well as he'd imagined. He'd planned to have a little bout with each of the _Kotsu's _to test their fighting styles. He'd hoped he would be able to match at least of one the Shichinintai members to the assassin by doing so.

But, as he'd come to realise, the self-appointed task had not gone as smoothly as he'd have liked. Jakotsu wasn't allowing him to get anywhere remotely close to their leader. And Inuyasha had pretty much gathered by then that neither Ginkotsu nor Kyokotsu could have been who he was looking for. They were too big, too slow and most of all, too stupid. Also, as he'd found out rather painfully, Jakotsu as the killer would have been highly unlikely too.

So that left only Bankotsu to be 'assessed'.

The hanyou was starting to feel the first inklings of exhaustion. Now that he'd decided that fighting Jakotsu was pointless, he decided to step up his offence. It would do him no good to hold back any longer.

His claws were of no use to him in this situation. He needed a long-range attack.

Channelling energy into his abused chest, Inuyasha leapt into the air. He dug his claws into the already-healing wound on his upper torso and brought forth fresh blood to the surface.

"Hijin Kessou!"

The slight widening of his eyes was the only give away to Jakotsu's surprise at the sudden, deadly bombardment of Inuyasha's hurtling blood-made projectiles. He pulled back from his initial attack to the air-borne hanyou to deflect each of the razor-sharp blood-claws away from himself.

With a speed that he had not yet used in his previous pathetic evasions of his opponent, Inuyasha kicked off the ceiling in the instant that Jakotsu withdrew his intended attack on him and hurtled through the air towards the boy. He buried his claws into his wound again and sent off a second wave of crimson blades at the boy. Jakotsu, caught by surprise by the sudden unexpected aggression on Inuyasha's part, fended off the rain of blood with his extended sword.

When Jakotsu swung his blade to the side to deflect one of the wayward crimson projectiles, it was all the opening Inuyasha needed. Even with his masterful control over the snake-like sword, Jakotsu could not bring its blade round fast enough to counter Inuyasha's immediate follow-up attack. The hanyou flew past his guard, claws poised and canines bared, and landed his first solid hit… on the hilt of Jakotsu's sword. In a last attempt to defend him self, Jakotsu had brought the sturdy grip up in front of Inuyasha's intended targeted area on his upper body. It took the brunt of the hanyou's attack.

Nevertheless, the force of the blow knocked Jakotsu to the ground and sent him skidding halfway across the warehouse floor. It hit the blade from his grasp and it clanked loudly to the concrete floor. Inuyasha didn't miss a beat. Jakotsu would never be able to defend himself now. He leapt into the air and tore his claws into his chest wound once more.

"Hijin-"

"I wouldn't do that if I were you."

With his adrenaline still pumping wildly from his previous workout, Inuyasha almost failed to catch the softly spoken threat. He smirked in the direction that he thought the speaker was in and continued drawing out more blood from his injury.

Inuyasha saw the dark figure of Satsugawa Bankotsu leap down from the second floor landing to stand in front of his fallen comrade before he sent out another rain of blood.

* * *

Sesshoumaru followed his nose to the exact spot on the soccer field that his brother had stood a little less than an hour ago. As he neared the unused goal post at the far end of the field, the dog demon instantly caught the unmistakeable whiff of blood and hastened toward the source. 

He crouched before a sunken patch of grass that he guessed was where his brother had stood, unmoving for the two hours that Higurashi Souta's soccer practice had lasted. The blood couldn't have come from Inuyasha. It was unfamiliar. It smelled…human. Sesshoumaru followed its faint scent towards the rickety gate at the corner of the field.

He kept on going past the gate and down the footpath until his nose became over whelmed by the foul stench of garbage when he turned to walk down a wide alley. There was no way he could rely on his sense of smell now.

Nevertheless, Sesshoumaru didn't find him self alarmed. His eyes skimmed over the trail of utter chaos that his brother had undoubtedly left. A couple of fallen trash cans here, a huge, foot-made dent in the dumpster there, a couple of smashed glass bottles up ahead…

Inuyasha couldn't have left a clearer message. His brother had known what he was doing. Maybe he wouldn't kill the idiot off after all.

* * *

Ginkotsu and Kyokotsu gave startled cries when Inuyasha's claws of blood impacted with the second floor landing they had moved to stand upon after Jakotsu had started fighting. The platform crumbled and fell apart, taking them along with it. 

The hanyou had had his entire attention focused on Bankotsu when he'd unleashed his deadly crimson blades in a totally different direction from where the leader of the Shichinintai had stood. The hulking pair had been so focused on the potential fight between their leader and the half-demon that they'd been unprepared for the surprise attack. As they fell amidst the metal and debris of the platform they had previously occupied, the last thing they saw was Inuyasha Taisho dropping to land somewhere in front of them.

The hanyou gave him self a mental pat on the back as he moved to kick Jakotsu's serpentine blade to the far end of the warehouse, away from its wielder who was now picking himself off the ground. If Bankotsu had been in any way angered by Inuyasha's attack on his comrades, the human boy didn't show it. He cast a brief glance in their direction to ascertain their physical status. They were unconscious but indisputably still breathing. Inuyasha had missed the two on purpose, choosing instead to knock the ground out from under them, effectively rendering the pair unconscious. His assignment couldn't afford the publicity that would undoubtedly arise if he managed to kill off members of the Shichinintai.

But he had needed the chance to fight Bankotsu uninterrupted.

"Well, well, well. You're quite the devious little hanyou aren't you?"

The voice of the boy in question betrayed nothing.

"You made Jakotsu complacent by holding back and you tricked my brother and Kyokotsu into thinking that the attack that you dealt them had been intended for me… I don't know if I approve of this mockery to our group."

Bankotsu sauntered slowly towards the half-blood, rolling up his long sleeves in a lazy and distracted fashion. Inuyasha scoffed and stood his ground.

"The Shichinintai is a pile of useless shit if four of you can't even bring down one _devious little hanyou._"

The boy was entirely too calm for Inuyasha's liking. If he wanted a fight, he'd have to get Bankotsu riled up. The black-haired youth waved his hand dismissively.

"Pft. If Jakotsu had wanted to kill you he could have. He likes you too much. Eh, Jakotsu?"

The younger boy grinned in reply, cradling his broken right wrist to his chest. His voice betrayed none of the pain he might have been feeling.

"Where's the fun in killing someone like you off so quickly? I'd have preferred to watch you bleed to death slowly. That would have been beautiful, Inu-chan!"

Inuyasha growled in reply and flexed his claws in anger.

_'Fucked up pervert.'_

He chose to ignore the offending youth and turned to his leader instead.

"Hn. So much confidence in your little lackey. How about doing some of the dirty work _yourself _for once!"

With that the hanyou rushed towards the dark-haired boy before him. His claws found air when they swooped over the area where Bankotsu stood. Or, to be precise, the area where Bankotsu had _once _stood. The hanyou skidded to a halt.

_'What the…?'_

A hard-kick to his back informed him as to the whereabouts of his opponent. He broke his fall with a roll and leapt back to his feet. He swung round just in time to bring his arms up to protect his face from Bankotsu's follow up kick.

"Oi! Ban-chan! Not the face remember?"

Jakotsu called from his corner of the warehouse.

"Right, right."

Inuyasha growled. The bastard wasn't even taking him seriously. He caught Bankotsu's next attempted blow to his abdomen and swung the boy over his shoulder and onto the floor under them. But Bankotsu seemed unfazed. With a speed that left Inuyasha's mind-reeling, the boy swung his legs round and kicked the hanyou's legs out from under him. He saw the ground rushing up to meet his face. The force of impact seemed to magnify ten-fold because of the injuries he had already sustained from his previous bout with Jakotsu.

The pair flipped themselves to their feet immediately and Inuyasha charged once more.

It was mind-boggling, the way the human boy was able to keep up with his demonised speed. Bankotsu's status as a primary suspect in his mind grew with each passing minute that the two exchanged blows in gruelling hand to hand combat. And through it all, the slight smirk on Bankotsu's face never faltered.

"What's the matter, hanyou? You run out of blood to do your little trick with?"

Inuyasha spun round to deliver a sound kick to the side of Bankotsu's face. The boy stumbled back some and took his defensive stance again. The hanyou frowned. Nothing seemed to permanently faze his opponent. His endurance was frustrating and he seemed to have an impossibly high tolerance for pain.

"You want it? Be my guest. Hijin Kessou!"

Inuyasha sent a wave of crimson blades in the human boy's direction. He frowned when he found that the pain in his chest seemed to intensify after his attack. That meant only one thing. He had lost too much blood. He couldn't afford to use that technique again, for it would likely put his body in serious danger.

Unlike Jakotsu who had been unprepared for his assault, Bankotsu seemed totally unaffected by it. He'd seen how the attack worked and so it posed him none of the threat it had his comrade. He evaded the first projectile, twisted clear of the second and leapt over the rest altogether, all the while sustaining only a slight scratch to his right cheek.

"What business does the Shichinintai have in a private school in the city?"

Inuyasha questioned as he leapt up to avoid a well-aimed high kick from Bankotsu. The boy let out a humourless chuckle.

"Heh. I don't think that you're in any position to be asking questions, hanyou."

Inuyasha felt the heaviness of his limbs. He cursed himself for letting the fight with Jakotsu last for as long as it did. It had drained him. He had barely any strength left to last through a fight with the obviously even more highly-skilled Bankotsu. And as the bout wore on, Inuyasha started to feel the first inklings of unease. A hard kick to his mid-section sent the hanyou crashing into the wall behind him. It took all of his strength not to crumble to his knees then and there. He tried to still his heavy breathing.

"If you bastards are so… confident in your abilities, why the fuck haven't you been able to kill me yet?"

Bankotsu let out a loud scoff.

"Please. You're worth nothing to us dead. The people we kill, we kill for a price. This is merely a little warning."

Inuyasha leapt at him.

"The fuck are you on about!"

It was as much an act of self-preservation as one of an offensive nature. In order to prevent him self sustaining any more serious damage from Bankotsu's ever strengthening attacks, he needed to weaken the other boy. Inuyasha caught Bankotsu's fist in his hand as he tried to throw another punch to his left cheek. He yanked the human boy forward and delivered a powerful upper cut to his jaw. Bankotsu flew through the air to land several feet away from him. He brought a hand to his abused chin as his jaw flexed experimentally. Inuyasha heard a few satisfying clicks as the bone re-set itself. The boy smirked and got to his feet, taking on the same defensive stance he had used before. The pair circled round, each gauging their opponent's intent. Inuyasha spoke first.

"See. This is what happens when you take your opponent too lightly."

Jakotsu's all-too-cheerful voice interjected.

"You're mean, Inu-chan, spoiling Ban-chan's face like that."

Bankotsu caught Inuyasha's clawed fist in mid-strike and used his momentum to fling the white-haired hanyou away from him. His body made a heavy thud against the hard, grey floor. Still, he forced himself to his feet and turned to face an advancing Bankotsu who had begun an explanatory monologue.

"Your people have _nothing _on us, hanyou. A few filthy rumours about our suspected involvement in various crimes. That's hardly substantial enough to convict us. And we're not stupid enough to give your government any reason to do so."

Of all the things Inuyasha had learnt today, not underestimating one's opponent should have been at the top of the heap. And yet, the hanyou found himself unable to fully grasp that concept. Without warning, he felt an overwhelming force barrel into him from behind. With a strength that was uncharacteristic for an injured individual, the iron-fisted youth that he had previously deemed out of commission had launched him self up from his fallen position and slammed the unsuspecting hanyou to the ground. Before Inuyasha had time to recover from having the wind knocked out of him, he felt the coolness of metal being plunged into his left shoulder.

"Ginkotsu!"

The firm voice of his aggressor's older brother stopped the boy from tearing the hanyou apart in a mad rage. Inuyasha growled and struggled to free himself. But Ginkotsu held him down firmly. His older brother knelt before Inuyasha and yanked his head up to meet his gaze.

"Listen well, half-breed. We're not going to kill you today. Consider it a form of thank you for sparing Ginkotsu and Kyokotsu's lives before."

Inuyasha growled loudly.

"Bullshit! You just don't want to give the people I work for any reason to step up their investigation."

Jakotsu giggled.

"Good, Inu-chan! You catch on fast."

It was then that the half-blood sensed a familiar presence approaching the warehouse. Even with his mind pre-occupied trying to keep his body from losing consciousness, it still managed to recognise the unmistakable scent of Sesshoumaru. Not since he'd been stuck at the orphanage more than a decade ago had Inuyasha so welcomed the impending arrival of his older brother.

The hanyou felt new found energy as adrenaline pumped hard through his system. All he needed to do now, was buy some time. Bankotsu's expression became deadly serious. He yanked Inuyasha's head up more roughly.

"I'll say this only once more, hanyou. Currently, your people have no substantial evidence to accuse us of anything at all. We do not want for that to change so keep your filthy nose out of our business."

Inuyasha rolled his eyes.

"You just beat the crap out of me. You think they'll take lightly to that?"

Ginkotsu twisted the steel rod that had the hanyou pinned to the ground. Inuyasha forced himself not to make a sound as pain shot through left shoulder. Bankotsu grinned.

"They will. We'll make sure of that."

He lowered himself until his face hovered mere inches above Inuyasha's.

"Because you are going to tell them nothing of our little encounter, nor anything that you might have discovered about us during your short stay at the academy."

Inuyasha scoffed. He needed to keep them talking until his brother arrived. He'd found their first possible suspect, but in his current state, he wouldn't be able to bring the boy in without assistance.

"Keh. Like hell I won't."

He heard Ginkotsu's angered growl as his hair was twisted painfully in Bankotsu's grasp. The dark-haired leader's voice grew deadly calm.

"Oh, I think you'll be inclined to agree with us. Because if you so much as rub us the wrong way from now on, we'll be forced to resort to… certain drastic measures."

Inuyasha narrowed his eyes.

"What the hell are you trying to say?"

Bankotsu's sardonic smirk widened in amusement at the hanyou's show of aggression.

"Well, the academy alone has so many potential hazards. The students there are totally unsuspecting…"

The hanyou growled and thrashed a little.

"You bastards wouldn't dare. You really think you'd be able to get away with murdering innocent children-"

"Who said anything about murder? I have a number of depressed clients at the institution. Life's been hard and they've come to rely on the… _goods_ I sell them. All it'll be is a _little mix-up _on my part."

Bankotsu's grin never wavered as Inuyasha's eyes widened a fraction.

"Ingestion and overdose of toxic substances is a rather common form of suicide in the society of today, you know."

"You piece of-"

The leader of the Shichinintai continued speaking as if he hadn't heard the hanyou.

"And, as you would probably also know. Your president's tragic demise still weighs heavily on the people of Sengoku. You wouldn't want them to have to face the death of a _second _member of the Higurashi family… now _would you_?"

Inuyasha felt intense fury boil within him at Bankotsu's none-too-subtle implication. The boy's grip in his hair loosened and disappeared altogether. His voice grew faint as he spoke his next words.

"Remember, half-breed. It's all up to you. If we find that we've come under threat from your government in any way. We will not hesitate to follow up on our promise. You take care now!"

The sound of footsteps echoed in the silence before fading away.

It was rage that saw Inuyasha pushing his body up from its sprawled position on the floor immediately after Ginkotsu's hold on him disappeared. His arms shook with the effort it took him to wrench the steel rod that had impaled him to the floor, out of his shoulder. He grit his teeth let out a loud growl when finally, the metal shaft pulled free.

But when he got to his feet and glanced around, all four members of the Shichinintai were no where to be seen.

Inuyasha snarled in anger and punched the wall _hard _with his uninjured arm.

"Fuck!"

In his rage, the hanyou had failed to notice that the scent of his brother too, had disappeared.

* * *

Bankotsu flipped open his cell phone at exactly six o'clock in the evening and dialled an unfamiliar six digit number. He leaned against the subway wall and waited for someone to pick up on the other end. The call was answered after exactly five rings. 

"It's me."

The deep voice that filtered through the hand set was low and calm.

_"Is it done?"_

Bankotsu shut his eyes.

"We took care of it."

"_You killed him, then._"

The dark haired youth frowned in annoyance.

"What kind of idiots do you take us for? Of course we didn't kill him. It would arouse too much suspicion."

"_Do as you must. But I warn you. He might pose quite a threat. His job is to expose the Shichinintai after all."_

Bankotsu replied calmly.

"Look, we did what we had to. He won't be much of a problem anymore."

"_I still suggest that you silence him for good."_

Bankotsu's eyes snapped open in annoyance.

"Look asshole. You paid us to do a fucking job at the institute. Not to play assassin to some loud-mouthed government lackey. If you've got some vendetta against the bastard then deal with it yourself. We don't do jobs for free."

The voice on the other end sounded unfazed.

"_I assure you, my intentions toward the hanyou have nothing to do with this whatsoever. The information I gave you on the boy is entirely accurate. He is after the Shichinintai."_

"Good. Because if that was some sort of cheap way of tricking us into killing the hanyou for you, then you can go right ahead and fuck yourself. No one plays the Shichinintai for fools."

With that Bankotsu snapped his phone shut and stalked toward the bench where his comrades sat waiting.

The four-person group then proceeded to leave the subway station.

* * *

From a phone booth several miles away, a dark-haired figure emerged and went on his way.

* * *

Sesshoumaru stepped out from a shadowed corner beside the staff room doorsin the Teruyama subway station,where he'd followed his brother's four aggressors to.He ran the telephone conversation he'd listened to from his hidden spot over in his head. 

_'Interesting.'_

The day just kept getting better and better.

* * *


	13. Peculiar Developments

_**Puppet Without Strings**_

* * *

** Chapter 12**

Inuyasha woke to the sound of a door opening and promptly wished he had stayed sleeping. He was propped up against something uncomfortably straight. It stood perpendicular to the surface he was sitting on. A wall of some sort. His lower body was stretched out on a surface which, after careful analysis from his fragile mind, he decided felt cold and scratchy. It let off a distinct and musty odour. Concrete.

The hanyou cursed whoever had gone and let loose the swarm of bees that were currently assaulting the interior of his skull. His temple pulsed so loudly that he could hear its rapid beats clear as day in his ears, which miraculously were the only appendages on his body that felt unaffected by the rest of their host's inept state. They twitched in triumph.

However, even the buzzing throb in his head paled in comparison to the sheer agony it caused Inuyasha to move his upper body. In spite of this, a decade of military schooling kicked in and the hanyou ignored the predicament of his battered self in favour of analysing his current situation. He tried to force his eyes open but found even that menial task challenging. They were devoid of moisture and the dry, surrounding air assaulted them in their dehydrated state. The skin that had previously shielded the amber orbs fell back into place over them when glaring orange light met their dark pupils as they raised themselves to glance around.

The sun was low in the sky. It would set in an hour or so. How long had he been out? It didn't matter. All Inuyasha felt like doing right now was going right back to sleep. His body screamed instinctively for rest and repair.

But the hanyou was refused even this luxury. The footsteps of whoever had entered the area grew louder as the person approached. Even without looking, Inuyasha recognised it to be his brother.

As much as it troubled him to do so, Inuyasha fought hard to remember how he had come to be in his current state. He forced his reluctant eyes open and blinked several times until a comfortable dampness was reached. The minute the half-blood took in his surroundings; everything came rushing back with startling clarity. He was still in the same location that he'd suffered the horrendous beating from the shichinintai. Inuyasha vaguely remembered sliding to the floor in exhaustion after his attackers had left. He must have passed out then.

It looked about eight in the evening. The setting summer sun painted its golden colour onto the interior of the deserted warehouse. He must have been lying there for two, perhaps three hours.

Now that the immediate threat of the shichinintai had moved into the background, the hanyou couldn't decide if his brother's impending wrath would be any less perilous than the beating he'd received from Bankotsu and posse.

He sought to pinpoint the exact amount of damage his body had suffered. With how much his head hurt, he guessed he'd hit it a couple of times. His brain hammered against the confines of his skull in fierce protest of its agony. He tried moving his legs and was relieved to see that they hadn't been damaged to any great extent. But the hanyou soon found that not all of his body had been granted the same good fortune. When he braced his hands on the floor to push himself to his feet, he found his left arm unwilling to comply with this intent. He ran his eyes over the limb in question and traced the source of its defect to the gaping hole in his shoulder, made obvious by huge rips in his shirt. He brought his only working hand to his mid-torso. The area was blemished with an unhealthy shade of faded blue-black.

Inuyasha exhaled, relieved. At least his ribs had healed quickly. The injury looked worse than it felt. He'd give the bruising the next day or two to completely vanish.

The hanyou huffed and brought his previously outstretched legs in and pushed off the floor with his good arm to put his body to a stand. He felt his head swim and his vision blur and fade for a second and Inuyasha braced a hand against the wall to get his bearings while his body adjusted to the new position. After a few controlled deep breaths, the half-blood spoke.

"Er…Hey."

The numerous injuries that marred his person made it impossible for the boy to pull a confident act off convincingly, despite his best efforts to appear unfazed by his brother's stormy aura. His left arm hung limply at his side as he stood, hunched before the older demon. Full awareness of his physical state was only reached while in his standing position. Air did indeed get thinner the higher up you got. It had suddenly become a lot harder to breathe. He found himself wobbling on his feet when he stepped away from the sturdiness of the wall to confront Sesshoumaru face to face.

His brother stopped an arm's length before him, straight-faced and silent. Inuyasha knew better than to lower his guard. If there was one thing he'd come to learn in all the time he'd spent under his half-brother's care, it was that the calmer and stiller Sesshoumaru got, the less likely it was that the object of his wrath would emerge from an encounter unscathed. And currently, that… Inuyasha cringed… meant him.

However, the dreaded verbal assault never came.

After an indefinitely long amount of time, in which nothing had occurred but silence and uncomfortable shuffling, Inuyasha started to get impatient. If his brother was going to get all dark and quiet around him he might as well get everything over with. What was the point of just…standing there? Sesshoumaru had yet to meet his eyes. Silken bangs, almost identical in shade to Inuyasha's, shielded his eyes from view. The man appeared to be in deep thought.

"O-oi. Sesshoumaru…"

The urge to extend a finger for a prod was strong. But the hanyou resisted. He nearly jumped back in surprise when his brother's eyes snapped up to meet his face of their own accord. They scanned over Inuyasha's body, assessing the damage it had suffered. They took in the numerous bruises, the caked up blood and the tattered fabric before finally coming to rest on the unsightly rod-made opening in the half-blood's left shoulder.

The silence forced Inuyasha's thinking to go into overdrive. Something suddenly struck him as odd.

He'd distinctly remembered sensing his brother close by during the fight with Bankotsu. Yet the man hadn't stepped in to help. And now here he was standing before him a few hours later, quiet and pensive, doing naught but staring him down while refusing to utter so much as a word of explanation. Inuyasha was suddenly irritated. So much for safety in numbers. Sometimes he wondered if Sesshoumaru even valued his life.

The man ended his appraisal of him with a soft exhalation. He looked somewhat… satisfied. Inuyasha's eyes narrowed. Yes. Sometimes he wondered…

"Where the hell_-_"

Inuyasha's irritated inquiry was cut short when he felt a sharp blow to his unbruised cheek that sent him careening back into the wall behind him. Satisfied that he would not kill his brother by doing so, Sesshoumaru had delivered a sound punch to his face.

The hanyou cradled his abused cheek in shock as his legs gave out from under him and he slid into a sitting position not unlike the one he'd woken up in. That had been totally unexpected. He hadn't even seen his brother move.

"The _fuck _was that for?"

Inuyasha heard the soft crack of Sesshoumaru's knuckles when the dog demon flexed his fingers and clenched his right fist; the one that had connected with the half-blood's face. It obviously had been a long time since his brother had used the appendage in any act of violence. His voice resonated in the emptiness of the warehouse.

"_That, _little brother, is what I think of your damnable impulsiveness. That you have managed land yourself in a pathetic state like this is nothing short of degrading. Father did not go through everything he did to have a son that cannot even hold his own with dignity."

Sesshoumaru's glare could have frozen the fires of hell itself. The slight addition in volume to his usual speaking voice was only a subtle sign belying the true extent of his anger toward Inuyasha. It was strange how the man could elicit such intense ferocity through his eyes alone while the rest of his face remained unmoved. Inuyasha couldn't help the small cringe that had formed. Even in spite of his guilt, he had to fight back the urge to defend himself. It might have been childish, but somewhere in the background, the need to prove himself to his only living family had always existed.

However, in a rare show of discretion, the hanyou chose to keep his mouth shut while his brother continued his diatribe.

"You were out of line, _hanyou_. You have neither the authority nor the aptitude to negotiate with criminals. Thanks to your actions Higurashi Kagome and an indefinite number of other innocents have now been made unknowing targets of terrorists."

Sesshoumaru sighed deeply. Indeed he did realise that his brother's actions had helped to push the investigation forward. But he failed to see how the hanyou always managed to turn a small problem into a huge one. If he had handled the shichinintai with less hostility and more tact, perhaps they wouldn't have _had _to resort to such violence. He could have very well lost his life in the process. This was just one more unneeded setback.

The tall demon brought a hand to the bridge of his nose.

What was it about brash decisions? How hard could it be to just think the consequences through before simply jumping straight in to potential danger? Was it some sort of trait that ran in the family? _They'd _all lost their lives that way. His mother to protect his father, his father to protect his cause and his human step-mother to protect Inuyasha. Seeing all that had practically shaped Sesshoumaru in to the person he was today. Had it not been for his cautious nature, he might have lost his life ten times over during the war.

But, unlike him, Inuyasha had not had the luxury of learning from the mistakes of his elders. Call it adolescent rashness, but already, Sesshoumaru could see parallels between his brother and the rest of his deceased family.

"If you want to get yourself killed so badly, do so at a time when I will not be dragged into the situation. Our purpose here is to find a killer and prevent further nuisances to our government from surfacing."

Sesshoumaru knelt before his brother and yanked the boy forward by what was left of his collar.

"It is _not _on our agenda to add to the sizeable list of problems Sengoku already has."

Inuyasha growled and slapped his brother's grip free of his shirt. The frowning half-blood turned away from Sesshoumaru, not wanting to meet the older demon's eyes.

Despite the show of defiance, the fact that Inuyasha had chosen to stay quiet and take his lecture without argument, was proof enough to Sesshoumaru that his brother did acknowledge his own guilt. This somewhat abated his anger and the taller demon rose from his crouched position to stand once more over his half-brother.

"Should a repeat of this incident happen ever again, I will not hesitate to drop you from this assignment. In which case, you may or may not be punished for your poor choices."

Sesshoumaru's feet made soft crunches when he turned on his heel and started walking away. His voice seemed to have returned to its normal volume when he spoke next.

"But I suppose your actions were not entirely unproductive and because of that I am inclined to let you off just this once more."

Inuyasha's head snapped up in curiosity. Had he heard right?

"What are you tal-"

"How long do you plan on sitting idly, Inuyasha? You are wasting time."

Inuyasha gaped. Really. The spontaneity of his brother's mood swings could be rather scary.

But the half-blood knew that in his own unique way, Sesshoumaru had been showing some degree of concern for him just then. His brother resented the fact that he had failed to report back to him before choosing to confront the shichinintai by himself, thereby jeopardising his own safety. For as long as he'd known the man, Sesshoumaru had never been one for showing any sort of conventional brotherly affection toward him. The upbringing that came with being the only full-blooded son of an almost legendary taiyoukai had seen to that.

It was a trait for which Inuyasha was grateful. God knew the hanyou would have driven a person any less imperturbable than Sesshoumaru Taisho off the proverbial edge of sanity.

Inuyasha sighed. Even still, did the son of a bitch really have to hit him quite so hard? Inuyasha swore his face must have swollen three sizes already. And more importantly, why had his brother had run off to god knows where while he was getting horribly trashed by the Kotsu's? As it were, Inuyasha decided to leave his questions for later when Sesshoumaru was perhaps more settled. Angry as he was, Inuyasha knew that his brother would still want a full account of what he'd learnt from his little escapade. The man could be hypocritical like that.

"Are you incapable of understanding what I just said?"

The mocking tone of voice achieved its desired reaction, which was to have one annoyed hanyou up on his feet and following after him. Inuyasha growled in irritation and struggled to catch up with Sesshoumaru's quick pace. _Struggled_ being the choice word.

"Oi! A little mercy for the half-dead sibling if you please?"

He received no answer. In fact, his brother only seemed to quicken his stride. He was doing it to spite him. Inuyasha _knew _he was. He yelled after him again.

"Sesshoumaru!"

The dog demon's pace never slowed even as he gave his answer.

"While you were here lazing around I managed to happen upon some rather alarming information."

Anger was what motivated Inuyasha to quicken his pace despite the pain it caused him to do so.

"What! You left me for scrap and ran off to do your own research?"

Sesshoumaru never even paused.

"If you want to put it that way, then _yes_."

The dog demon slid the already-opened metal doors wider just a fraction as he strode through. Sesshoumaru didn't want his brother straining himself too much trying to fit his decrepit body through the narrow opening he had previously entered by. The action went unnoticed by his seething sibling, who had stopped abruptly, voice lowered in threat.

"Explain."

Sesshoumaru frowned in impatience and glared over his shoulder.

"I followed them and over heard a conversation between Satsugawa and their employer."

Some people just never knew when to be grateful. He could have very well left Inuyasha to limp his own way back to the school, but instead he'd chosen to return and retrieve him. The decision had been a mixture of brotherly obligation and a stark concern that the hanyou might get himself into more trouble should he be left on his own for any larger amount of time. God knew the boy was a walking magnet for danger.

Even now Inuyasha seemed dissatisfied with his answer.

"And?"

The question was uttered as his brother limped up his side. Sesshoumaru turned away and glanced up the street.

"Not here, idiot."

He tossed Inuyasha his fallen cap, which he'd found along the way to the warehouse earlier. The hanyou had chucked it in one of the alleys he had passed with Jakotsu to aid his brother in finding and locating him. Inuyasha raised his eyes in question as his brother gestured to an approaching vehicle. The boy immediately propped the headwear over his ears to conceal them from view.

"Who's that?"

Inuyasha squinted as the vehicle drew nearer. Its glaring headlights prevented him from seeing anything beyond them.

"Our ride. We're heading to Toutousai's research facility to get you fixed up. Can't have you bleeding all over your school and drawing unwanted attention."

The hanyou rolled his eyes.

"Why didn't you drive?"

"Peak hour traffic. I left my car at the facility."

"Oh."

* * *

Miroku pulled up along side the ashen-haired pair in his borrowed Toyota Starlet. The vehicle had seen better days. He supposed it had once been white, though with how old and dirty it was currently, he doubted it would ever regain its original shade. The monk sighed dejectedly. 

When Sesshoumaru had rung in to Toutousai's workplace and requested a ride to take him and Inuyasha there, Miroku had jumped at the chance to get as far away from the eccentric inventor as was physically allowed. The hands that the old inventor had tossed his car keys into had been eager and impatient, feelings that had intensified ten-fold when the man had told Miroku to make his way down to the private reserved lot of the facility to look for the vehicle in question. The reaction was of course, with good reason. After all, a highly-skilled, federally employed senior inventor receiving an annual income of hundreds of thousands was supposed to have a killer ride. It was an unspoken, de facto law. One didn't park in the private lot with its heightened security if that wasn't the case.

But, as things went, Buddha must have been punishing him yet again. All those years of napping during prayer sessions had returned to kick him square in the behind. He'd forgotten how many times he'd hurried round the parking lot trying, _hoping _that the scrap of metal he'd seen before him hadn't been the one he was to be driving and that Toutousai had been talking about the _other _white vehicle with license number T0T0541. The bloody thing had barely even had enough fuel to make it through the short journey to the river front. Miroku had had to fish out his own spare change to fill the tank up with just enough petroleum to make the journey back to their destination.

Toutousai sure was one cheap bag of bones.

Miroku's mental whining was cut short the minute he caught sight of his half-breed friend when the boy slid into the backseat of the car.

"Holy crap, Inuyasha! I haven't seen you this beat up since you fell off that cliff when you were nine."

For once, Inuyasha couldn't be bothered with a snappish reply. Instead, he resolved for a lazy come back of sorts.

"Nice ride, Houshi."

Sesshoumaru took the front seat and was in the process of buckling himself in when he glanced over to the driver's side in mild curiosity.

"My brother fell off a cliff?"

At this Inuyasha snapped back, irritated.

"Drop it."

But Miroku chose to ignore him. Instead he turned to the older demon.

"Yep. Little Inuyasha tried to hunt down a mountain boar. But the mountain boar decided he didn't like being hunted."

Miroku had always been one for fairness. He thought that as Inuyasha's brother, Sesshoumaru had a right to know…

"I said drop it, monk."

Yep, if life was going to make him miserable, he might as well share the favour with the very person who had put him in his current state. Inuyasha wouldn't be able to harm him in his condition. Plus, he was driving. And unless the hanyou wanted to meet his death earlier than planned on the treacherous roads of Sengoku City, he would be at Miroku's mercy.

"Yep…"

The monk nodded to himself and pulled onto the main road.

"…I'd never seen someone run so fast in my life."

Sesshoumaru now seemed more than slightly interested. Oh yes. Payback was sweet.

* * *

The next few days were tough on the hanyou. He'd spent the whole of Sunday avoiding any sort of human contact within the school like a plague. Jaken had delivered his own watered down version of Sesshoumaru's lecture to which Inuyasha had only listened half-heartedly. 

After getting cleaned and bandaged up at the infirmary in Toutousai's research facility, the hanyou had changed into a set of clean, borrowed clothes, courtesy of an unwilling Miroku, and been delivered at the doors of Sengoku National in the early hours of the morning. In a rare show of leniency, Sesshoumaru had allowed the half-blood a three-hour nap in the research centre to give his body a chance to patch itself up some. Since he would be spending most of his time in his human body when he returned his duties at the institute, Inuyasha needed every chance he could to recover while in his hanyou form.

By the time he'd arrived at the institution, most of the damage to his ribs had been just about mended. His face still sported a number of faded scars and bruises but nothing that another day or two wouldn't fix up. The only potential hazard to his person that still remained was the wound in his left shoulder. The doctor had seen to it by stitching and bandaging the… hole, as it were, up. It was hardly noticeable through the fabric of his shirt. Still, Inuyasha knew he needed to recover fast. Such an injury would have likely posed a huge problem should he have had an encounter with either Bankotsu's group or the president's assassin in the near future.

Which was precisely the reason he'd spent the remainder of the weekend watching over the Higurashi children, hidden away at a comfortable distance, in his hanyou form. The hastened rate with which his demon blood allowed him to heal was much needed.

Come Monday, and lessons had resumed as per normal in SNIE. Inuyasha had gone to each of his, doing well to act as normal as was possible. Being in his human form only served to make the task more difficult. It was like he had suddenly become hyper-sensitised to the pain he was in. However, Inuyasha couldn't deny that he _had_ recovered immensely. He now hunched only a little, but it was nothing that couldn't be passed off as sloppy teenage posture. He no longer hobbled, merely walked with a slight limp. Any other person would have thought that he'd merely sprained an ankle or done something similar to that.

But what lay at the forefront of his awareness over the next couple of days hadn't been his rate of recovery. Instead, the hanyou found him self overly conscious of what he had learnt from Sesshoumaru after they'd arrived at Toutousai's laboratory.

His brother stated that the shichinintai had been hired by an unknown contractor to do some sort of a job at Sengoku National. But what, exactly, he'd been unsure of. According to the information Inuyasha had dug up from Principal Kinou's student directory, Satsugawa Bankotsu and his brother had only transferred to the school recently. Given the high cost of fees for students lodging in the institute itself, the benefactor must have been of some calibre of wealth, and with the reputation that shichinintai had gained, that financier must also have been intent on getting whatever he wanted here done.

The only important question that remained was whether the seven man group's assignment would have any impact on their own investigation. Of course, on one hand the shichinintai might have absolutely nothing to do with the president's murder, in which case, Inuyasha would have nothing to worry about. But something just didn't sit well in his mind. And thereby came in the second, more troubling scenario. Could it have been coincidence, assuming Higurashi Kagome's powers had surfaced around six months ago when she scheduled all those impromptu doctor's appointments, that Bankotsu had enrolled into SNIE at around the same time?

Of course logically, Inuyasha would have preferred the former of the two possibilities. In any case, there was also the fact that the boy was now the primary suspect in Inuyasha's book, even though he _was _taller than the physical profile given in the case report. But then, that could easily be understandable. One couldn't trust a couple of fuzzy surveillance videos.

_'Hn. With my luck the bastard probably has everything to do with this case.'_

Inuyasha grumbled under his breath and rested his face in his good hand. He eyed the dark-haired girl two levels his junior in her English lesson one floor down on the opposite side of the building. Her room was facing his and his position beside the window made it easy for him to see her, but not the other way around. Like him, Higurashi Kagome wasn't paying attention. From his higher disposition, he could see the novel she was holding beneath the desk. Inuyasha clicked his tongue softly.

He supposed from a frontal perspective in the classroom, the girl looked every bit the epitome of diligence. She occasionally took notes, glanced up at the board at regular intervals in a convincing show of conscientiousness, when really she was anything but. He didn't see the need for all that garb. But of course she _was _the daughter of an ex-president and as such must have been held to higher standards than other teenagers. Even though, as a small smile graced Kagome's face when she read something of amusement, Inuyasha could tell that she wasn't any different from your common, modern day youth.

Well… excluding the fact that her life was now in jeopardy from possibly more than one source.

He turned away just as the girl stiffened and glanced up to look in his general direction. It was as if she'd sensed his eyes on her. Inuyasha lowered his head onto his outstretched arm and sighed, drawing lazy shapes on the surface of his desk with the index finger of his other hand. The position effectively hid him from view.

For a human girl, Higurashi Kagome had unusually keen senses. It must have been a trait that came with her powers.

After some time, the girl passed off the feeling as mere paranoia and turned to her book once more when she saw nothing of suspicion. Inuyasha straightened and went back to his initial pose with his chin in his hand once again. His previous thoughts resumed.

Sesshoumaru and Miroku had agreed that as long as the shichinintai remained unprovoked (and they had both cast pointed glances his way, at this), nothing bad would befall the ex-president's daughter or any of Bankotsu's other clients for that matter.

But Inuyasha knew that if he were to be able to find any semblance of a clue as to what the group's purpose in Sengoku National was, then he'd need to do some more investigating. However, that too had been made highly complicated, what with how the group's leader had threatened the life of the very girl he was supposed to be protecting.

Having to deal with Satsugawa Bankotsu being in such close proximity to himself, as well as Higurashi Kagome, was daunting. Inuyasha found himself being overly cautious in his actions of late. He hadn't let the girl out of his sight since he'd returned from his encounter with the seven man team. Of course, given the threat that they posed, the wise choice would have been to lay low and keep out of the limelight. But laying low would get him nothing where the investigation was concerned and thus, was out of the question. It was already mid-week and still, no further developments had occurred.

In such a situation, the hanyou found himself doing something he'd never once considered him self capable of doing.

He'd started to bide his time. Watching and waiting.

* * *

Elsewhere, Miroku's tests on a certain little black sphere continued. 

The pill didn't have the characteristics of any medicative substance he'd seen before. It seemed to have neither the stimulative nor anaesthetic properties that most drugs contained. And it lacked the chemicals commonly associated with the damaging of brain cells found in other illegal substances. In fact, it seemed to be rather… harmless.

What had struck Miroku as most startling was the fact that it contained materials strangely close in chemical structure to... bone? Miroku had frowned at that. But the monk couldn't determine if the substance had been human or not. After that little finding, he'd worked for two days straight but had achieved little advancement in his research.

He'd started to feel the first inklings of frustration start to settle around him, when unexpectedly, he'd received an epiphany.

The test had been made entirely on a whim. It had been more of a joke really, since he hadn't been getting very far with any other part of his examinations. If someone was grinding up bone to make drugs then maybe they were psychotic enough to add some blood into the mix, right? Like one of those witch's concoctions little kids used to read about in story books.

_Eye of toad, tongue of dog, bone of newt, blood of frog… _Stuff like that, perhaps.

Not that Miroku would have _ever _read something that silly.

In any case, the monk had playfully extracted a small fragment of the pill to be tested for the presence of blood. Who would have thought that right then and there, he'd already received his second break. Sesshoumaru had frowned when he'd reported his findings to him. After all, Miroku had ascertained that the blood had belonged to someone human. Or, at the very least, a youkai that was able to take human form.

But this was something that neither he nor the monk could afford to dwell on.

By the fourth day, Miroku had already prepared a DNA profile with the help of one of the medical staff at the research centre. The favour had come easily. It went without saying that Miroku, being Miroku, would have already charmed the youngest and prettiest out of all the workers there, even in the small amount of time he'd had to socialise.

So now all that was left to do, was match the profile to its owner to solve the mystery of Bankotsu's pill. And as Inuyasha had told him over the phone the other day...

"Happy hunting, monk. Sengoku's population is what? A hundred and twenty million? That means about fifteen people are murdered everyday. Seventy-five percent of the bodies of which are never found."

That was of course, assuming that the blood-donor, so to speak, _was_ indeed dead. Miroku sighed. It was just one problem after another, wasn't it? It seemed like he would never get through this.

Then there was also the possibility that one of the shichinintai members had leant some of their blood to make the pill. But for what reason? He'd been back to the old warehouse to collect some samples. He'd managed to retrieve some of Jakotsu's, being the only one that had shed any large amount of blood, but his DNA hadn't matched the profile at all. It was just his luck that Inuyasha, being the idiot he was, had made the shichinintai overly cautious of the government with his actions. He had severed any hopes of ever getting a sample from the rest of the seven members.

So, with this new stumbling block in place, the monk had turned to another means of drug identification. To find out how it affected its user. And being the self-sacrificing individual that he was, Miroku had used himself as a guinea pig. He'd infused a little of the drug into a sample of his own blood to see how it would react. He was also currently in the process of contacting Sesshoumaru Taisho for a request.

After several beeps on the com-link, the man in question answered.

"Yes."

Miroku eyes crinkled sheepishly.

"Taisho, do you think it's possible to give me Higurashi Kagome's blood?"

Hm. That hadn't come out as well as he'd planned…

* * *


End file.
